


F*ed Another

by chezchuckles



Series: Trauma Spy [7]
Category: Castle (TV 2009)
Genre: F/M, One Night Stand, affair, castle introduces an element of bondage to their relationship, drunk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-20
Updated: 2020-09-17
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:33:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 22
Words: 99,238
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26002708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chezchuckles/pseuds/chezchuckles
Summary: Trauma Spies have had four or so years of family life, but it's fraught with breakdowns, break-ups, and misunderstandings. When Castle moves his family to New York City with the intent of giving Kate back some of her old life—and then promptly leaves on an overseas mission for the CIA—Beckett is trapped in the city where her trauma began, with twin boys who, while understanding, are still the product of a government science experiment.So Beckett does a runner, as she often does, in an effort not to damage her family with all of her damage.This time, Beckett tries to burn it all down by fucking someone else.Castle chases after her.
Relationships: Kate Beckett & Richard Castle, Kate Beckett/Richard Castle
Series: Trauma Spy [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1821298
Comments: 68
Kudos: 59





	1. Chapter 1

She woke disoriented, terror hovering at the edges of her confusion, so dark that it made her mouth dry, her throat tight.

Where?

She groaned when she moved, bruised, remembered falling and scraping the skin off her elbows and forearms, the sting of pain that nearly eclipsing the other.

The hovering, dark other.

The noise from the other side of the room made her freeze, heart stopping.

Oh, God.

She had.

Oh, God.

Kate jerked out from under the sweat-stained blanket, lurched to her feet, falling around the end of the couch and dropping to her knees. She vomited twice, stomach acid burning up her throat and in her sinuses. 

The male grunt, the alcohol-soaked unconsciousness had her jolting to her feet, hand over her mouth.

Clothes. Her pants. Oh, God, she had done - it. Done this. She had done this and she didn’t know where she was, who the fuck is that, she didn’t know, oh, God-

“Darling,” slurred from across the room. 

She felt the sick rising in her throat and shoved her legs into her jeans, hands shaking, desperate, desperate, scrambling. She had no idea where the fuck she was.

Her phone was - phone. Where, oh God, where was she, what had she done. What had she done, what had she done to him.

Castle.

Rick.

She pressed her hand over her mouth and closed her eyes, fighting hard against the urge to vomit, sick and swirling with a hangover, the worst - worst thing she’d ever done.

He was never - he shouldn’t. He should never forgive her for this. Never forget. 

Where was her - where were her things? Keys, she had no idea, where had she left - maybe the club. She had no idea. No phone, no keys, she’d left the house without ID because she had been such a fucking idiot, oh God, she had ruined everything.

Kate hit the door before she could get her bra closed, jerking out into a grungy hallway and under a harsh light. She didn’t know the time, where the fuck she was, she had no money, she was-

She wanted him.

She just - she had ruined everything and she couldn’t possibly - their sons. And she had fucked some stranger because of a fucking panic attack, because she was fucked up in the head, she was fucked - she had destroyed everything.

She had to get out of here. Had to get - out. Just out. Away. If she could just get clear of this place, she could think. Just think. She had no phone, no keys, no ID. She hadn’t managed to clasp her bra, God, she was walking around in a strange apartment building in New York City, walk of shame, the worst worst shame and she had no idea where-

Kate stepped off the elevator and had to press her hands to her eyes just to keep from sobbing. If she started crying now, she’d never stop, and she had to figure out where the fuck she was. She had to figure this out.

She wanted to go home.

Oh, God, she could never go home again.

Kate slumped back against the wall, and then her knees gave out. Completely out. She felt the sob in her chest and broke.

\-----

“Ma’am? Ma’am. Ma’am, please...”

She lifted her head, shocked breathless when she was confronted by an older man with a heavy grocery bag over the handle of his cane. She pressed her hand over her mouth to keep from sobbing; he looked terrified.

“Are you okay?” he said, as if afraid to ask.

She shook her head, not sure what she was saying no to him, what she was saying. 

“I... can I call someone for you? Wait, here, I have this cell phone my granddaughter makes me carry around. This, here, take this, call-”

She had an old school phone being shoved into the hollow between her throat and her knees, and she had to catch it before it clattered to the floor. She stared at it.

“I can’t - help you much,” the older man said. “I walked to the grocery store. Every Monday morning. I walk the five blocks. It takes a lot out of me, I’m sorry to say. Shame. It’s a shame. I’m afraid if I offered you a hand, I’d fall over. Gotta sit down. I might come back for that phone after I’ve had a rest.”

Her fingers clutched around the phone.

“Whew, the walk does me in. I’d offer to help you up, on your feet, you know? Being on your feet helps. But I’m gonna have to get upstairs with the last of my energy or I won’t make it. Keep the phone. If you have to leave, you put it by the mailboxes. I’ll get it later.”

He was already walking away. He was walking away. He was leaving her. He couldn’t help; he had done what he could, but he was afraid of her; she must look insane, she was insane, she had lost it. She had fucked someone else.

She didn’t know - know where she was, she was just - alone. She was alone, and she was a fucking danger to society, she was going to-

Call him. Call him, she was going to call him and say she was sorry. At least say she was sorry. He deserved-

Better.

But last time, last time he had been so damn worried about her, he had been furious because he hadn’t known where she was. She had lost her phone that time too and he hadn’t been able to trace her, to help, he’d said, just to know if she was safe-

She called him.

She called before she knew she was doing it, before her brain could catch up to muscle memory or desperation or grief, whatever it was that made her punch in his phone number.

He answered with a gruff noise, not even hello, wariness.

The keening noise broke from her throat and she sobbed his name, curling up around the phone. 

“Kate?!” His voice was loud, too loud, such relief, and she didn’t deserve that. “Kate, baby, where are you? Tell me where you are, honey-”

She sobbed. She just - sobbed.

\-----

Listening to her sob was killing him.

He had no idea what she’d done, but she’d done something. She was in some fucking residential building in the reconverted warehouse district; he’d traced the phone the second she had called - it was fucking habit now - but God, had she killed someone?

His guts churned. He had stopped trying to talk her around. She never responded well to a faceless voice, not even his, but this time she had just sounded gutted, and he didn’t know - he was so afraid - he felt it in her, how bad it was, whatever it was, how damn bad it was and the fear was eating him hollow.

It was her fear too, and he knew that, but he couldn’t separate himself out.

He drove furiously, and fast, zipping around corners and flooring it on the straight streets. When the GPS pinged his arrival, he hit the curb as he parked carelessly, but he was already jumping out of the borrowed car and slamming the door shut.

Apartment building. Six in the morning. It had been only twenty minutes since she’d called. He kept the line open, carrying the phone with him as he ran for the front door, slammed through the lobby and spilled inside.

“Kate,” he bellowed her name. She could be on any floor. Any fucking floor, though the CIA task had at least told him the pinpoint longitude and latitude.

He rounded the corner for the elevators and jerked to a halt when he saw her. He crashed to his knees before her crumpled body - was she hurt? oh, God, had she been shot? - reached for her.

Froze when he smelled sex.

Her eyes opened, puffy and bloodshot.

She smelled like sex.

\-----

“What happened?” 

She ached. He was holding himself away from her; he already knew. She could see it on his face.

She pressed her hands over her eyes and couldn’t stop sobbing. 

Suddenly his hands came around her wrists and gripped hard and she cried out, rigid with pain.

“What happened to your arms?”

She hissed through a breath, didn’t jerk away from him. She wanted it to hurt. She always wanted it to hurt. “Fell.”

“What happened. What did you do.”

She had nothing. Throat dry as the desert.

Castle sank back to his heels. His eyes slid away. She closed hers, couldn’t imagine why she had let herself call him. Why had she done that? She should have gotten her shit together and made herself - she should have done this differently.

Oh, God, so much she should have done differently.

“You gotta use your words here, Beckett, because my mind is coming up with a thousand scenarios. I’m thinking the worst.”

She sucked in a ragged breath. “It is - the worst.”

His face blanched. Eyes darting to the elevators, eyes like stone. “He’s dead.”

She froze. 

Why had she thought he wouldn’t be out for blood?

“I’ll get rid of the body,” Castle gruffed. “Tell - me what floor. What apartment. I won’t call the team. I’ll do it myself.”

She blinked.

“Beckett, time’s wasting. Someone will call the police. Was it - the knife? But a fight would-”

“No,” she croaked, horror sliding in her guts. “No, he’s not dead.”

Now Castle froze. 

“I-” The sob came up again and she tilted her head back, couldn’t look at him and say it, couldn’t say it.

His hand came to her knee, slowly, a touch. “Kate?”

The tears streaked down her face. “I fucked - I let him fuck me.”

He took his hand away.

\-----

“You did what?” he said. 

Like he hadn’t heard. Like her words weren’t bouncing around inside him and crashing into every single bone in his body.

She just cried.

“You had sex with-”  
someone else

It went through him then, sharp, piercing, so that he doubled up, unable to breathe.

Hands planted on the floor, he sucked at the air, the pain in his chest unbearable.

“I’m sorry,” she sobbed. “I’m so sorry. It was - wrong, everything is wrong, I was wrong and stupid and I’ve ruined us, it’s over, I ruined-”

He jerked upright, moving too fast even to comprehend, and his hand was around her throat and cutting off her words.

She croaked and her eyes went wide, her hands clinging to his arm. Do it.

He gripped and dragged her into him, altering just enough to pinch the back of her neck and make her flinch in pain, the pressure point of a nerve. She wept. He was rigid with fury.

“You don’t get to ruin us,” he snarled.

She sobbed.

“You are not allowed to say it’s over.”

Her arms came around him, snaking around him, and her tears soaked his skin, but she felt him flinch. She must have felt it because she sobbed his name and clutched at his shirt.

“You smell like him,” he hissed.

She only cried harder.

\-----

“Stand up.”

She shivered and jerked away from him, but he wouldn’t let go of her. 

“Stand up, Beckett.”

She couldn’t quite get everything working at the same time, she felt sick, she felt reeling with sick, but he was yanking her to her feet. The pain in her arms where the skin had come off was sharp, made her breathless, and his fingers were wrapped around her wrist as he pulled her towards the doors.

“You’re going to tell me everything.”

“No!”

He turned around and yanked her through the lobby door, out onto the sidewalk. Fury had etched lines into his mouth. His nostrils flared. “You. Are going to tell me. What he did. Where. How many-”

“Just once, once,” she sobbed. “I couldn’t-”

“Oh, you couldn’t,” he snarled, jerking his head away and starting forward again. Dragging her after him. There was a red sports car on the curb and the engine was running.

He hadn’t even turned off the car.

Her heart was shattering.

“You could let him fuck you but you couldn’t fuck him? Is that it?”

She let herself be shoved into the passenger seat, but instead of him moving around to the driver’s side, he crouched before her and gripped her knee. Hard.

“You let him use you. Use you. Like a thing. Again.” His chest heaved and he surged to his feet, gripped the door. “I hope you had fucking protection. Don’t want someone else’s kid foisted on you.”

She gasped, reeled back, as he slammed the door.

Her breath came in blades.

He got in the driver’s side and slammed his fist into the steering wheel. She jumped, shocky and trembling. He did it again, again, punching brutally against the wheel until the horn sounded and jerked them both out of it.

He was breathing hard.

He was crying.

She was too.

\-----  
It was fourteen blocks. It was fourteen blocks during rush hour morning commute and he was stone cold silent.

He said nothing.

She swiped at her cheeks and tried to stop crying but she tasted ashes in the back of her throat, ashes of his - respect for her. Where he had used to think of her as - as his - and now she knew what it was like to be no one’s.

She just cried.

It wasn’t the good kind. It didn’t make her feel better, it made the panic attack worse, and she knew that - she had four years of knowing that - but she had the most reason to panic she had ever had before and hysteria had a fist around her lungs.

Maybe he was taking her somewhere private to kill her.

She almost hoped he would.

She was so fucked up. “What is wrong with me?” she cried out.

His curse made her flinch and she leaned her forehead to the window and closed her eyes, unwilling to see the end.

It was long, and it was fourteen blocks, but suddenly they were there, parked, and he snarled stay in the fucking car, Beckett, and she opened her eyes.

A hotel?

He came back with a key card and a face like thunder and he opened her door for her. Like - a gentleman.

She felt like a whore.

“Stand up,” he snarled.

She jerked to obey, tangling in the seat belt he had lashed around her at some point during the drive. He reached out and grabbed her arm, flipped the keys to the attendant, and pulled her down the sidewalk - away from the front doors.

It was the hotel where they’d stayed when - when Alex and all of that.

She was going to be sick.

She was sick.

She had to jerk out of his hold and lean against the side of the hotel’s concrete facade as she threw up, people scattering. He didn’t touch her. He waited, grabbed her arm when she raised the back of her hand to her mouth.

His eyes were icy.

She followed, tugged like a prisoner after him. He walked her down the block to a side door, and inside the entrance where he had to use the keycard to let them inside.

She was shaking. He rounded a thickly carpeted corner and pulled her after him, and she realized he was going to fuck her. He punched the button for the elevator and wouldn’t look at her and she stared at him.

He was taking her here to fuck her.

Her heart surged into her throat.

\-----

Inside the room, she looked small.

He felt a thick cloying grief in his chest and couldn’t keep looking at her.

He pushed her towards the bed and moved away, back for the door.

“Rick?”

He turned and jabbed sharply towards the bed. “Stay. Stay the fuck here.”

Fear burst to life in her face and she scrambled up to her feet, running for him. He dodged and grabbed her by the arm. She twisted-

“Beckett. Fuck. I’m going to fucking hit you if you don’t give me a fucking minute.”

“Don’t leave me alone-” She broke and sobbed and he turned and slammed his fist into the wall, hard enough to jostle the bones of his hand, hard enough to bring pain receptors to life and his head to clear.

He pushed her to the bed and stalked to the phone, snatched up the receiver. Jabbed his finger on the numbers.

Office picked up. He could hear the echo of business as usual. He recited his daily code and request number, there was a break and a click and then his right hand man was on the line.

“Castle?”

“I need you to run an errand for me,” he got out.

“Okay.”

“The pharmacy downstairs - no need to send this out.”

“Okay, a list?”

“List,” he confirmed. He turned his back on her, closed his eyes. “Compression bandages, iodine or hydrogen peroxide, debrading swabs, surgical tape.” His throat closed. “A run of anti-virals. A rape kit. And the morning after pill.”

No noticeable response. No questions from the man. He was very good at his job; he knew better than to ask after state secrets. 

“Where do I deliver?”

“Hyatt. Room 1413.”

“Got it. Give me ten to gather everything from our guys.”

“I’ll be here.” Castle hung up the phone, took a breath. Another. He turned around and she was still standing there, her jaw slack, her face white.

“I-” She pressed her hands to her face. “I didn’t think.”

“I know you didn’t, Beckett. You never do. You never think about protecting yourself.” He pushed past her and moved for the bathroom, went inside and closed the door.

He sank to the floor with his back against the door so she couldn’t come in, closed his eyes.

He had to sober her up and dress her wounds, wash the stink of male off her before he could take her home.

Home.

He didn’t even know what that was anymore.

He didn’t want the boys to know.

\-----


	2. Chapter 2

When his phone buzzed in his pocket, he lifted his head and smeared his hands across his cheeks, one at a time, being thorough. He stood up, checked his reflection in the mirror, entirely unseeing even as he saw the gaunt bones of his face, and then he pulled open the door.

He took a breath, standing in the entryway before the main door and the room, and he checked his phone. His man would be coming up in the elevator. He should warn Kate. 

He stepped around the corner and into the hotel room but it was empty.

His heart froze in his chest for an instant, a bewildered and furious moment of not again not again, and then he saw the curl of her toes behind the dresser. 

The breath left him in a rush.

He went forward over the soft carpet, and he found her body pushed into the small space between the dresser on one wall and the HVAC unit on the other. She had pulled her knees up to her chest, as small a target as possible, her arms over her head as if to shield herself.

Asleep.

His phone buzzed. He turned and went for the door, opened it carefully. His man was on the other side, a briefcase slung over his shoulder. Castle nodded and reached out for it; the exchange was silent and without commentary - even facial tics.

The man left and Castle shut himself into the motel room, locking it, flipping the privacy bar for good measure. He carried the briefcase to the second bed, popped it open, pulled out the first aid kit.

When he turned around, the abrasions on her forearms were hard to miss. He knelt down at her side and inspected them visually, hoping not to wake her. Easier if he didn’t have to both dress her scrapes and also patch up the wounds in her heart. 

She looked ragged. All the way around, heart and skin both. 

“Ah, Kate,” he sighed.

Behind her raised arms, he could see the tangle of her hair, the droop of her mouth, and the tracks of tears through her mascara and eyeliner. His wounded wolf.

He settled at her side, gauged the situation. Her body position, her self-defense, the way she’d flown at him earlier. So he pushed his shoes off, peeled off his socks, just to keep steel-toed boots out of it, and then he rolled up his sleeves.

He sat side-saddle on the floor, carefully easing the side of his shin over her feet, trapping them. He reached for both wrists, knowing the second he touched her, she could startle.

She would startle.

She did startle.

The scream ripped out of her throat, both feet tried to kick out, her arms shoved - but he had her; he had her trapped by him. 

“Beckett,” he snapped.

She oriented, her face turning to him, her body rigid. He gripped her wrists to keep her there, knowing it must hurt, called her name again. Her eyes came to him. They were black holes.

“Hey,” he said gruffly, the wound still in him as well. “Your arms, Beckett.”

She was still rigid, still staring at him like he was an apparition, but she didn’t offer resistance. He released one wrist and reached for the alcohol swabs in the kit, tore a packet with his teeth. He pulled one out, the sharp scent rose up and she flinched violently, turning her head, eyes closing.

He swiped it down one forearm and she let out a sound.

“It will sting,” he said. Better late than never.

She hissed a breath but now her hands were trembling; she scraped the free one through her hair and closed her eyes.

“How,” he said roughly. Touching the debrading towelette to her forearm. “How did this happen.”

She sucked in a breath. She was crying again, the tears slipping down her cheeks. “Bricks.” She made fists of her hands and closed her eyes, and the tears came faster, silent, terrible. “The - wall.”

“Ah.”

He was not sure he was going to survive this. 

\-----

She tilted her head back to breathe, his fingers careful on her forearms. He was being so careful. She was shaking, and he was wrapping surgical tape around the gauze on her forearms.

She swallowed and his voice broke the silence.

“We’ll start anti-virals,” he said. “This morning. Orally.” When she looked at him, his mouth was a hard line. “And viricides. Which. Will have to be inserted. With the rape kit.”

Rape kit.

An excuse. Or being practical.

“Inserted,” she echoed.

“Can you - do it yourself?” His brow furrowed. His hands released her arm. 

“You - mean I-” She stopped. He didn’t want to touch her. She made a fist and brought her arms against her chest, finding it hard to breathe. “I can do it.”

He nodded, not looking at her. “I’ll leave out the first pill. And the bulb. Comes with instructions. So.”

She pressed her fist into her sternum, but it didn’t seem to help. “I - for STDs. That’s - what you mean.”

“Yes.”

“God.” She had done - this. “Oh, God, the boys-”

His face hardened. Against her. “Colin has them. We won’t go back until-” His throat worked. “You can.”

Until she didn’t reek of betrayal. “I’m - sorry. I... want - want you not-”

His eyes closed. Opened. He stood up and left her there on the floor. She tried to breathe, watching him move methodically, purposefully, taking items out of a first aid kit, placing everything just so. “Might be easier in the bathroom. I’ll put everything on the counter.”

Kind. He was being kind and she didn’t deserve it.

“Rick.”

He straightened up, spine stiff, but he didn’t look at her, just headed for the bathroom. She buried her face in her hands, swallowed back tears; she felt sick. She didn’t want to throw up again. 

He came back into the room and stood there.

She would have to stand up. She would have to go in there and do this, and then-

Find a way back.

He stood over her and she dragged a breath into her lungs, best she could. She angled her elbows into the corner and pushed herself up to her feet, feeling it between her legs, feeling it at her hip bones. 

His fists released, his shoulders came down. He let out a breath. “Everything - is in there. Ready. You - uh - take as long as you need. I won’t - leave.”

She chewed on her bottom lip, her hands shaking, her body stained. His eyes averted, looking at anywhere other than her. 

She had called, panicked and desperate and in pain, and he had come.

“Castle?”

His eyes hesitated, but they came. Connected. He felt her just as she felt him, and she knew that made it worse.

His jaw worked. She knew what he was going to say, even as he said it. “I know you have to,” he scraped out. He was crying, and he didn’t bother to swipe at his cheeks. “I never - asked you to stay, only that - What did I do wrong, Kate?”

She sobbed, pressing her hands over her face and shaking her head. “No. No, Castle, I’m in love with you. I love you.”

\-----

His stomach dropped out.

She hunched forward and swayed, but he - couldn’t bring himself to catch her. She was sobbing.

Because she loved him.

Because Kate Beckett felt love like pain, and even four years of work and therapy and his steady - his steady-

“Damn you,” he growled, swallowing hard. He swiped at his cheeks and rubbed both hands down his face to erase it. “God damn you, Beckett.”

He dropped his hands and glared at her, mutinous, furious again, so fucking pissed off that she couldn’t just-

“Next time try some fucking candles and a dinner, maybe, if you’re looking to write me a fucking love letter.” He snagged her by the wrist and yanked her after him into the bathroom. 

He felt her shudder, but he also knew she handled pain like love, and if that was what she fucking wanted, then fine.

Fine.

“Did you - not hear what I said?” she croaked.

He slammed the bathroom door shut and she jumped, that wild skitter behind her eyes. She was this close to another panic attack; he was pretty sure she was in a panic attack, and nothing he did would make it easier on her.

Learned that lesson long ago.

“I heard you. I’m doing the fucking rape kit. You’re likely to slit your damn wrists.”

She grunted, a feral look tossed his way, but he pushed her to the edge of the bathtub and sat her down. She shuddered and brought her arms into her chest, but he leaned in and grabbed her knees, ran his hands down her calves to her bare feet, squatting down before her.

She shuddered hard and pressed her knees together.

He gave her a baleful look. “You choose now?”

Her mouth dropped open.

“I’m mean when I’m pissed, you know that,” he growled, tugging on her ankles. She let her legs fall forward, and he lifted his hands to the waist of her jeans, his hands sliding under the material.

Her fingers touched the top of his head.

It shocked him so hard that he sat back on his heels, her hand hovering just above him. “I’m sorry,” she murmured. “I’m so sorry. I - self destruct.”

He closed his eyes. It was pain all through him. “I know you do.”

“Not to hurt you but to - hurt me.”

“I know, Kate,” he whispered, opening his eyes and staring at her knees. 

Her hands cupped his face and he had to close his eyes. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“It’s life,” he husked. Her standard motto. Couldn’t help himself, throwing it back at her.

She gripped his skull in her hands and he tried very hard to keep still. To not - hurt. Hurt her. Hurt inside. Love was pain. She had begun to convince him of it as well.

Her hands withdrew, slowly, her breath sighing out. Two people. Not one. That was why it always hurt so much.

She went her own way and he always - was here. Waiting for her to come home. Love was pain. “Why did you... leave?”

“I meant to - I don’t know. Just get out of my own head. It was too much. Not you - just - my head. Always broken. I’m just - too broken for you. I-”

He laid his hands heavily on her knees, gripped them until she shut up.

“Pants off,” he told her quietly. “Underwear.” He lifted his head to look at her; she was crying again. “We’ll - you can shower. If you want.”

Her lips twisted. “I want - to go home.”

He shook his head. “Not while. Not while you’re like this. The boys will - feel too much.”

She broke, sobbing again, her face in her hands, but she slumped off the bathtub and into his body, into his lap, pressing up hard against him.

He groaned, hating - her, himself, everything - and drew his arm around her neck, burying his face in her hair.

She smelled like that fucking son of a bitch.

He put her off his lap. “Rape kit. Shower. Now.”

\-----

"I need to do an - exam first," he said. His face was impassive, but she saw his eyes, the shape of them like grief. "I know - I know it's - but it has to be done."

"No," she shivered. "No, I can't-"

"There has to be - you look like it hurts to stand up, Kate. There could be - tearing."

She closed her eyes and clenched her fists. "Wasn't - enough - to be tearing."

"God."

She tried to breathe. "I'm sorry. I - don't want to-"

"Tell me," he interrupted. Her eyes flew open; his face was grim. "Tell me what - how it happened."

She was mostly naked. Her bra was still on - jeans gone, no underwear and she didn't want to think about where they were (though she had a vague idea that they'd been on, and then off again, but he'd been drunk, too drunk to get it up and then fallen asleep). 

"You went home with him."

She sucked in a hard breath. "You don't - really want to know. You can't possibly-"

"Better than the story in my head."

"I... " Four years of therapy with him, the two of them sharing the worst, and even though her brain immediately formed up the logical queue, this and then this and finally this, she couldn't make the words come out of her mouth.

"James said the dog was inside," Castle said. A prompt. Back to where he thought she could handle it.

She nodded. "Wolf was inside all day," she whispered. Her lips twisted and she gave him a look, a shared triumph, a terrible feeling, to be connected like they were and know what it meant. Wolf was being tamed.

"And you identify with him and what? Thought your freedom was being-"

"No," she got out, shaking her head. "No. Wolf bit Wyatt."

"What?" he barked. "No. He was fine when I left. Wolf did not bite-"

"He did. He - it wasn't play. He was inside all day and he just - wanted - more. Or - to be out - or to want to be out, I don't know, but Wyatt was being rough and he grabbed Wolf around the throat, and Wolf snapped."

"But Wyatt was fine-"

She nodded shortly. "It - kinda healed up right in front of my eyes."

"Oh, God. That damn kid. He didn't tell me; neither of them told me."

"Because you said you'd put Wolf out if he bit them again."

Castle growled and slammed his fist into the lid of the toilet tank, a terrible crunching sound. She startled towards his hand and caught his fist before she realized she had moved, and then they both froze. Terrified of the wrong, the right, the things missing still between them.

Castle avoided her eyes. "So you left."

"I... panicked. In the bad way. James stuck close but - um-" She chewed on her bottom lip and tried to breathe. "Made it worse? Because he - um - I'm going to do that one day, have - I have done that - turned and snapped my teeth or - worse. God, I just did. I did worse, I ruined our whole lives because I can't stop wrecking things-"

"Not ruined," he gruffed. His injured hand snagged the back of her neck and drew her into him. Her breasts hurt where they pressed to him, chafed, but his body was quickly making hers warm again.

"Not ruined?" she whispered.

"Give me - time, Kate."

"All - all the time in the world. All I have, can possibly."

"And the story," Castle husked. "Give me that. Tell me what did and didn't. You took the car, not the bike."

"I - yes," she said, surprised herself. She had taken their car. So he couldn't follow. So it would be permanent. "So I could kill it - me? - destroy it and you couldn't stop me this time. It would be over, finally, and I - would know who I really was."

"Mine," he growled. "You're mine."

She snaked her arms around his torso and he squeezed her tighter, tighter. "Please don't let me be anyone else's."

"Who was he."

"He was - at a bar. He was making life miserable for this girl, and I - told him he was a fucking asshole and he should pick on someone his own size, and he said who, you, and I said I could take him - considering he had a dick the size of-"

"You're kidding me."

"Um."

"You chose the worst fucking asshole in the place."

"I. Yes? I - didn't exactly choose him. I wanted to - stop feeling everything." She pressed her wet eyes against his neck, sucked in a breath. That he held her at all, that he didn't put his fist into her but walls and toilet tanks and the counter... "I got very drunk. And it was - very hard to keep thoughts in my head."

"You can't hold your liquor, Beckett."

"I know," she whispered.

"Shit," he sighed. "You got drunk. Both?"

"He was already. I caught up. He said he'd show me his dick to prove me wrong and I said - I don't know what I said. I'm not sure I was talking by that point. He just grabbed me by the wrist and I..."

"You shut down."

"I... shut down," she whispered.

"God," he husked, cupping the back of her head, holding her like something precious. Even - after everything. "Kate, you can't do that, you can't let yourself close down when I'm not there to have your back. He raped-"

"No," she got out. "No, I - no. I was - there for that."

"When."

"I - don't know how we got to his building. But I - came to myself and I realized what - I was doing - how he was touching me and how - little it felt, how fucking pointless it all felt, and I wanted to kill him. I wanted to - I actually almost - killed him. But then I thought, better me than... him. Better I do it now, burn every damn piece to the ground so I could never, I could never-"

"Hurt us." Castle groaned and clutched too hard at the knot of her hair, forced her head back to look at him. "Do you know how fucking tired I am of that? How fucking little it matters to me if you hurt me? If you hurt the boys? So what? Wyatt wasn't even marked when I got home, Kate. And Wolf was on the couch with them. But you weren't."

"I know. I'm sorry. I know. I just can't make it - make it stay."

"You better fucking work on that, because this is not acceptable. I will fucking chase you down next time, Beckett. Do you hear me? No more fucking freedom if this is what you do to us."

She shivered, something dark snaking through her guts, something terrifying.

"The rest. Tell me. You arms and the brick-"

"It was - against the side of the building. I made him - made fun of him and told him to - I told him to."

Castle growled, his eyes devouring hers. "And."

She worked her throat, trying to find the words, closed her eyes so she couldn't see him. "My jeans and - panties. Pulled them down. Pushed against me from - behind and - um - it wasn't exactly... hard. I guess? I don't really know. He was - I thought he had died at the end because he pulled -out and - um couldn't get back in, I don't know, don't make me-"

"He came inside you or on you?"

Her jaw dropped, shame burning through her like fire. "I - don't know." She tried to swallow past the dryness in her throat. "I don't think he could manage it. In-side."

Castle's fingers did a hard press against the skin of her back, all five digits, until she grunted and went up on her toes, points of pain at his pressure. "On you. Here."

Oh, God.

"You need a fucking shower, Beckett." His hands came to her hips and put her away, and she deserved that. "First tell me how many-"

"No!" She gripped his arms and tried to hold on to him. "No, just - that once. I swear. God. It was terrible and it hurt and he was such a fucking - but then it was just - dazed. I think. And drunk, really badly drunk. I threw up and he grabbed me and pulled me inside the building and into his place and I don't know - he was falling down everywhere and just - trying to get his pants off, and mine were gross, sticky and - it just - was like a train wreck. I passed out on the couch. And I woke half naked and it scared - scared me. I think I woke up in a panic attack."

Castle's jaw worked. He was - so furious with her. She saw it, and her heart struggled in her chest, beating too hard with such a stupid hope, how she still, she still thought fury was attention, was good, was what she wanted, after all the damn therapy and four years of trying so hard and here they were.

Castle reached out and she flinched, but he leaned past her for the water and flipped on the showerhead.

"I’m washing you clean of him," he growled. 

\-----

When he lifted her over the rim of the tub and stuck her under the shower spray, he was so fucking furious with her that he was going to implode. And then her hair soaked and matted down, her arms wrapped around her ribs, and her bottom lip began to tremble. He knew she was using the water to camouflage her tears, and the anger sank like a stone in his guts once more.

He stripped his t-shirt off over his head and unbuttoned his pants, and her hands came away from her sides and reached for him. And stuttered, dropping, her cheeks flaming, her eyes shifting. Tears coming faster.

“I’m not fucking you,” he growled, stepping out of his pants and boxers, leaving it all on the floor. 

Her eyes darted to his when he got into the shower with her. But she nodded like she didn’t deserve that, and even though that had been his first thought - you don’t deserve it - he couldn’t hang on to that either. Not when that fucking thought had been the thing to send her running. I don’t deserve it.

“Don’t get me wrong, Beckett. I am livid with rage, and I am going to have you. But not when he’s still on you. And not before you’re checked out.”

“Check-checked out,” she echoed. She swiped at her face and rubbed her eyes. “No - no hospitals. I’m not - I can’t do that. You know I can’t-”

“By me,” he growled. “No one else touches you.”

She shivered and leaned forward, seeking him instinctively, and for an instant, he didn’t reach for her. He just - stood there. He wasn’t even sure he had meant to do that, but she flinched and leaned back, turned her face away.

He hurt.

Breathing was pain. He knew that. He was doing good to keep from weeping himself, and every time he thought about what she’d done last night, why she hurt, why her arms were scraped raw, why she smelled like a pine-scented air-freshener, it made his guts cramp and his lungs tighten.

“Turn around,” he told her.

She did without protest, not looking at him. He grabbed for the paper-wrapped soap, pissed now at the hotel and why the fuck did they have to be so cheap right this fucking second when he needed - he craved - her own scent or his - something, anything other than smelling like fucking hotel plastic suds.

He growled and clamped his faintly soapy hands on her hips and she jumped, skittering hard enough to slip in the tub. He caught her - it was instinct anyway, and it was the hard, brittle edge of his love - and he kept her upright against him.

His cock brushed her ass and of course it triggered the normal response despite how fucking awful it felt inside his head. In his shredded heart.

“Castle?” she whispered.

He couldn’t answer. He stroked soap suds up her ribs and then along her back, avoiding her breasts because it couldn’t be about that right now. It couldn’t. Washed first. Exam first. He couldn’t start fucking her just because he was heartsick and wanting to make a claim he had never actually had.

He had never actually had her. Can’t have a wild thing. He wasn’t sure she wouldn’t have been wild if Black had never happened to her; he thought sometimes she’d have been this way before - just less traumatic, less flinching, same urge to run.

Sometimes he had to tell himself that so he didn’t feel so fucking guilty for it all.

His head bowed forward, he breathed out and his forehead hit the back of her neck, hands gripping her hips. She shuddered and reached back, touched his thumb, closing her fingers around it.

He tried to take a deeper breath, finally lifted his head. 

It took him a second, but then he had it again. He stroked soap across her belly and down her thighs, moved around her back once more to be sure. All of it. He wanted it gone. She would have to - between her legs as well. Vaginal discharge and the viricides had to be used so that she’d be safe.

God, she’d been so stupid. So fucking stupid.

“I know,” she mumbled. “I’m sorry.”

“He could have hurt you. Badly. Could have been infected with something, looking to spread it.”

“I - I know.”

“Of course you knew,” he sighed. That had been the whole point. Burn it down. That’s what she’d said. Make herself unsalvageable. 

“I’m - sorry.” She squirmed; his hand was close. “I’m not - very good at knowing these things, Castle. You’re... my only-”

She stopped.

He sucked in a ragged breath. Was. He had been her only. 

It shouldn’t hurt so fucking badly. He’d had others. His fucking job had centered on it.

“If you needed to fucking comparison shop, Beckett, I’d have vetted a list of some fucking closed-mouthed agents under me-”

“Oh, God-” she moaned.

“I would have fucking hated it, but if you needed to know what’s out there, if you thought you were missing out-”

“No!” She turned violently and flung herself at him, pressing her body to his, her arms gripping his neck so tightly that it was hard to breathe. “No, no. I never - you’re all I want. You’re good to me and I’m - death to you.”

“You are my life, Kate. How many times do I have to say it before you believe me? How much does it take, because I will fucking do it, I will do anything-”

“I love you,” she sobbed. Her mouth was at his ear, her hands in his hair as the water burned over them. She was wracked with sobs. “I love you, Castle. It’s not you; it’s never you, and I - am so - sorry - it doesn’t help - but it’s so clear to me how much I want - this. When I thought I’d broken it beyond - broken us-”

“We’re broken alright,” he growled. “Fucking someone else isn’t how you say you love me.”

She shuddered, crying raggedly.

“But we’re not beyond. Broken mends, Beckett.”

“I’m sorry,” she choked out.

She had never been sorry before, and he supposed that was something.

“Can you - forgive me for this?”

He sighed, wrapping his arms around her and picking her up off her feet. “Forgiving you is easy, baby. Forgetting is harder.”

She nodded against him, curled her toes at the back of his calf, tentative.

“We need to get out of the shower,” he gruffed. “Let me do the exam.”

“I don’t want-” She let out a whimper and squeezed him harder. “It’s a - tool? A medical-”

“Kate,” he sighed.

“Just - I can’t. I can’t. You said know my limits, and this is it. This is my big one, and you know that, you know I’m going to shut down if you-”

“Kate, baby-”

“Just you. You do it.”

“I am. I’m going to do it.”

“Not the instru-” She shuddered and pressed her face into his neck. “Your fingers. You do it.”

His heart fell out.

“Please?” she keened. “Please, I’m going to do something bad-”

“Okay,” he rushed in. “Okay, I will. Just me, baby. It’s just me. It’s only me.”

“Only - only you,” she sobbed.

He gripped her harder and sank down to the edge of the bathtub, holding her against him until she could get herself back together again.

\-----


	3. Chapter 3

She was shaking, but he had her; he hadn’t let her go.

His hand cupped between her legs, his arm braced around her shoulders. She clung to that arm, her mouth buried in the muscle of his forearm, breathing as much as her lungs would take in. The water hit her knee and inside thigh, her legs hooked over his knees.

“You’re okay,” he told her. How many times had he said those exact words in the last four years? How many times had she thought she would die before she could draw a deep breath again, before she could manage to bring back her broken pieces? 

She hadn’t known broken; she hadn’t a single damn clue how suffocating it could be. 

“You’re okay; it’s just me. Only me, Kate.”

She clutched his arm, the heaviness of his body around her both so familiar and so strange. She had meant to destroy her whole life; she had intended to never have this again, but the moment she’d woken sober enough to know-

“I love you,” she said pitifully. Clutched him harder. “I’m sorry. I know I’m doing this all wrong-”

“Okay, okay, Kate. It’s not like it’s news.”

She shivered, sucking in a ragged breath. His fingers pushed against her and she tried to keep from closing her thighs. “I hope - hope you know, always know-”

“From the beginning, you let me know.” His cheek pressed against hers. “Just like this. When you couldn’t say the words, you gave me - yourself.”

And she’d given herself to someone else.

They were both silent, frozen, for a long time while that swirled at their feet and went down the drain.

“I need to touch you here,” he murmured.

She nodded, clinging to his arm. His fingers pushed against her again and moved through her folds, separating, skimming. Methodical, one place to another. 

It burned, her nerve endings awake, her heart thumping. She was somewhere between panic attack and arousal, and the problem was that they were often the same. Especially when he touched her.

“Castle,” she gasped, trying desperately not to squirm. It wouldn’t be fair. He didn’t want to be touching her. He didn’t want to have to touch her. She still - she had tainted it all.

“Okay, it’s okay,” he told her softly, his voice above the water, his voice all through her. “I know, honey.”

She didn’t think he did know. God. How fucking stupid could she have been? When she’d wrecked the motorcycle it hadn’t been half as bad as this. The boys crying because they couldn’t give her pain pills, exiled from them for a week before she could feel right enough to not scare them, not share the pain of a shattered wrist and broken ribs.

“I’m sorry,” she sobbed.

“God, stop apologizing. Stop. Just - let me fucking do this. I have to - push my fingers inside you, okay? You have to be-”

“I know, I know,” she choked. “Go. Just - do it.”

She knew it was coming but it still made her rigid. One finger, but both so invading and so good, what she thought she had killed for good, but not - not the same - not what it was, and she cried harder.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he whispered, kissing the side of her face, her cheek. “I’m sorry.”

She sobbed a laugh and lifted a hand to her face, turned sharply into him. “It’s hard to stop once you get going, isn’t it?”

He let out a harsh breath and his arm tightened around her shoulders - but she realized it was to keep her there, keep her still. He swiped his fingers around inside her and then retreated quickly, leaving her empty.

She pulled her knees up to her chest and pressed her face to her raised thighs, weeping now.

He shut off the water, and she was cold.

\-----

“Sit,” he told her, hand at her calf, trying not to touch her in places that would trigger another break. “Edge of the tub.”

She knew what came next; he had showed her the bulb, told her about the wash which would dampen viral growth, prohibit STDs. Her face was white, but she was gritting her teeth and she had spread her knees apart on her own.

She wasn’t shaking, but she had goose bumps. Her hair was in a wet rope over one shoulder, her breasts angry red like she’d been scratching them. Nail marks across the faint line of her tan.

He should never have brought them into the city. He had known it was iffy for Wolf to begin with, not having acres to roam, but after four years, he’d been so malleable.

Worse for Beckett. When Beckett had roamed, she had done this.

Motorcycle accident was better than this.

No, not - she had been in a lot of pain then. And now, at least, she wasn’t-

“Hur-hurry,” she said, teeth chattering now.

This was infinitely worse than the wipeout on the bike. 

Castle touched her thighs to let her know where his hands were, brought the bulb between her legs. “It’s cold,” he warned her, and squeezed the bulb in the same instant, before she could tense even further.

She gasped and lurched backward, her heels drumming the bathtub, but he caught her with an arm around her lower back. She clung to him and sucked in another breath, her hand in a fist at his shoulder, gripping his shirt.

“You got this,” he murmured, withdrawing the bulb just enough. He let it release and shook it a little. “One more, Becks.”

She nodded and gripped his shirt, and he moved the head of the nozzle back inside her and squeezed it again, making sure to spray the viricides as widely as he could. Her knees were jumping, she was bouncing on her toes so hard, and he withdrew again quickly, chucking it into the trash.

When he turned back, she was white as a sheet and her fingers were blanched.

“Kate, honey,” he sighed, opening his arms to her. She slumped off the edge of the tub and into his lap, curling up in a tight ball, not even able to hang on to him.

He stood slowly with her, feeling some of the wash leak out against his forearm where he gripped her. She was shaking now, her eyes screwed up tightly, and so he carried her into the room and laid her on the bed.

She didn’t move.

He couldn’t move away.

Castle ripped the blankets out from under her and slid in across from her, laying face to face - he wouldn’t go at her back, couldn’t. He pulled the covers back up over them and twined his arm through hers where she held had curled up so tightly.

He nudged his knee between her thighs and she mewled, her teeth chattering now and her fingers purple, her lips turning blue. She did this now, vasovagal response to stress, and if she wasn’t careful, she was going to pass out again.

“Breathe,” he murmured, trying not to be intrusive, not draw her attention to him. “In and out on three.”

She sucked in a ragged breath, but her eyes came open and sought his like thrown daggers. He touched her chin with this fingers and slowly eased back along her jaw.

“I’m - okay,” she croaked.

“No, you’re not,” he murmured.

“I’m sorry-”

“It’s - not okay,” he said honestly. “But you - you are forgiven. You hear me, sweetheart? Come here, come closer.”

She squirmed to get nearer, wound her arm around his neck, her body at an odd angle to his. She was still shivering, her skin in goose bumps.

“Let me keep you warm,” he murmured, petting down her wet hair, pressing her against his body. “The rest can wait. You need me. And I’m just grateful you called.”

\-----

"I know," she whispered. "I know but I just-"

Her words broke off and she didn't have any left to explain.

He was, as always, quiet to hear her. 

And eventually as she was taken over by the slow cadence of his heart beating under her ear, the words came back, surfacing as if in a magic eight ball, coming up from the murk. "It's always inside me. The thought that I don't deserve the life I have, the love. And it's not just - him and what he did to me. It's my mother. She's gone; she's dead. She was murdered in front of me and I couldn't stop it or help or - even let her know - I couldn't promise her it would be okay because it wasn't then. And my dad."

"Because he died searching for you," Castle sighed.

"Yeah." She swallowed and closed her eyes, reassured by the even tones of his heart. Still beating. Still beating for her. He was angry, and she knew that would be a long time before it healed; she had wounded a dark place inside him. She had known it was there, she might even have subconsciously expected this to be the thing that broke him from her.

But it hadn't. And now she had to live with the consequences.

"They died, but you lived," he said.

"Yeah." She felt the chill creep up her back but Castle's hand chased after it, his whole arm pressed along her spine and between her shoulder blades. Keeping her warm. "Yeah, I lived. And then those messages in my head which say I'm dangerous, I'm too unstable, and how I keep proving them true-"

"Self-fulfilling prophecy," he interrupted. Which he wasn't supposed to do, but he did a lot because he loved her and he leaped to her defense. "You start telling yourself you're stable, you're competent, and you'll fill that too."

"I know," she said again. It wasn't anything they hadn't said before.

His fingers stroked through her hair, the first soft touch she'd felt from him since - before. Since home. He combed the damp strands of her hair away from her neck, from the still drying places on her skin. "You aren't unstable, you know. You're reliable, steady - you are the most loyal pers-"

She closed her eyes and pressed her face into his chest. "I'm sorry. I'm so-"

"No, stop, hush. Stop. You - still are. A mistake doesn't change your basic character. A mistake."

"A huge-"

"The biggest of our fucking life, that's for sure," he growled.

She shivered and hunched in against him, but the anger she understood. The tenderness, the gentleness of his touch, she didn't understand that at all. How could he still love her with any kind of soft regard?

"A mistake," she sighed. "You never make mistakes."

"Moving us to the city was a mistake," he gruffed. His hand clutched at the back of her neck. "I shouldn't have pushed."

"I wanted-"

"You didn't. You told me twice you didn't know if you could do it every day, and what did I do? I bought us a house in Manhattan Beach - like proximity to the water would help."

She sighed out against his chest. "But I love the water."

"But it's not the fortress of solitude."

No. It wasn't. And there were constant people, and the house was cramped, and Wolf wanted out but he couldn't always go out, and the beach wasn't deserted ever. Ever.

"I'm sorry for that, Beckett. Sorry I did this to us, set you up for failure."

Failure.

"Why do I keep doing this?" she whispered.

His arm tightened around her and suddenly she was being pitched off his body to the mattress, but he was crowding into her, practically on top of her. "Progress, Kate. Remember? Everything is progress."

"This isn't progress, this is hurting - hurting you, hurting my family-"

"Hey, hey, it is progress if we make it that way. Baby, hush. You spoke the words all on your own, no prompting, no cajoling, no contingencies. You put your heart out there. For me." His hands framed her face. "For yourself."

"I do love you," she cried out, lifting up into him, her whole body trying to be subsumed in his. Meet his.

"I know. I have known. Don't particularly love that it took the biggest asshole in the bar using you for you to have that particular breakthrough, Beckett, really don't love that, really fucking hate that you needed to hurt yourself to know how good we are-"

"It wasn't you," she groaned, flopping back to the mattress, arm over her eyes. "It's not about you, Castle. It's not about - if it is about you, it's only because you're light years out of my league, you're golden, and perfect, and you love me completely and without - without hang-ups or issues-"

"That's not true. You know that's not true. We fight constantly. I bully you, order you around. I withhold information because I think I have to shield you from it. Or worse, I just don't think about you needing to know. I take over with the boys and try to do it better, and I get so fucking frustrated with you when you won't eat the dinner I make."

She laughed, dipping her arm down to look at him. Oh. Oh, he really did. "I'm not - good about eating," she whispered.

"I know that," he growled. "And yet I still get my feelings hurt every damn time." A breath. "And then I take it out on you."

"You put the boys to bed without me," she said.

"Or I take Wolf out alone."

"I do that too."

"But the difference is, baby, you need Wolf out there alone to decompress, to feel less trapped, and I don't. I need you, and you took you away from me."

Her mouth twisted, her heart, and even though the tears stung her eyes again and made her throat tight, she snaked her arm around his head and brought him down against her, into her. "I know," she whispered. "I know I did. Never to hurt you, never to really hurt you. Just to punish me."

"But you punish me," he cried out. "You punish me and I just love you-"

Her heart soared even as it wrenched with grief. She held his head in her hands and kissed his cheek, under his eye, kissed him with the tenderness he continued to pour over her and had all morning even though she didn't deserve it. She kissed his skin and she avoided his lips - she would until he moved or reached for her - and she made her body a cradle for his over her.

She combed her fingers through his hair, her mouth pressed to his jaw, his ear. "I love you, too. I love you back. Castle, oh Castle, you are more than my life, you're my force of will and my strength and my only good. I never want to hurt you, I never want to mistake you - make this mistake - want - I just want - marry me."

He went rigid.

Her whole body was in flames. "Marry me," she whispered, shaking. "Marry me. Make me - make me your-"

"No."

\-----

He felt her go rigid. Felt her withdraw.

But still. No.

No. Not because she made a fucking mistake. Not because in comparison, he was better than some asshole in a bar. Not because she was trying to prove something that didn’t need to be fucking proved.

“God damn it, Beckett,” he growled, lifting his head to look at her.

She had her eyes closed.

“Don’t do this, Kate. Don’t you dare.” He gripped the back of her neck and dragged them both up to the headboard. “Not after the fucking night we’ve had. Just - fuck. Take the victory and stop pushing for things we’re not anywhere near ready for.”

She pulled her knees up to her chest and buried her face in the heels of her hands.

Fuck.

Castle leaned back against the headboard, closed his eyes in dismay. What was he supposed to have said to that? Yes, Beckett, let’s get married and see what how fast we self-destruct.

“Is this not good enough?” he said, opening his eyes slowly. Ceiling was stained in the corner. Made him feel so damn depressed. “Not good enough that you call and I come running to pick you up, no matter what you’ve done.”

Silence from her, and he turned his head and saw she had her arms wrapped around her knees, staring mutely at the top of her thighs.

“Not good enough that I love our boys, love raising them with you, that I have-”

“But what good am I?” she hissed.

“So. Because you don’t think you’re good enough. You want us to get married.”

Her jaw worked.

“I think you mean it,” he said quickly, and then- “I know you mean it. I know you want to jump into it, Kate, because that’s what you do. And fuck if I don’t love that, you just fucking go-”

“I run.”

He sighed, rubbed his thumb and finger at the bridge of his nose. “Damn.”

“You don’t want to marry-”

“Yeah, I do,” he sighed. “I’d - really love that.” And for a second, he couldn’t help thinking about it, wishing it so hard, as he had since the state trooper had called to say his wife had been in a motorcycle accident. His wife.

She’d had the cover ID on her that morning. So she’d been his wife. And he had - like an idiot - called her his wife every chance he could get away with it. A week in the hospital, a week of hovering over his wife.

She wasn’t his wife. She was - nowhere close to it. Four years of therapy between them and they had finally learned to fucking communicate, to work out a system for these times when she just couldn’t any longer.

“You’d really love it but no?”

“No.”

She growled and flung off the sheets, struggled out of the bed only to have her body betray her, going down to one knee. 

He moved to help her, but she struggled back up alone, stalked off - still naked. And goose bumps rippling cross her flesh. She strode to the bathroom and shut the door, and he heard the fan start up, heard the water in the sink cut on, masking any other sounds.

Great.

She was probably crying.

\-----

Kate washed her face and found his shirt on the bathroom floor, pulled it on over her head to stop smelling - everything else. She flushed the toilet where she'd thrown up twice more, washed her hands again, tried not to look at herself in the mirror. She brushed her teeth with a finger and the complimentary travel tube, spit it out and stared into the bowl.

She felt sick again, but she couldn't do that any more. She had to eat when he made dinner, she had to stop letting her body dictate what she did, who she did, how far she ran. Eat his fucking dinner - why did it have to be so hard? It didn't. She would sit down and she would eat it. 

God damn it. What the fuck was wrong with her? It was never enough, nothing she did ever filled her up.

Except with him. Him. And he didn't want to marry her. Or he wanted to marry her but she wasn't enough.

She just - wasn't enough. She couldn't even fuck it up right; she had to panic and call him the second she woke up, cling to him selfishly. If she had just fucking burned it to the ground, if she had just been able to - years ago - if she could have known, somehow, what she'd do to him, she would have gone ahead and done it.

Ended it. Before this. Before no, I'm not marrying you. Before her stomach in knots and unable to eat a simple dinner. Before the dog had sunk his teeth in her heart. Before she could have lived up to all those miserable expectations, fulfilled every terrible thing he'd insinuated about her.

She didn't deserve that life anyway. Better Castle say no. Better that it's clear, always clear, where she stands.

A fist landed heavily on the door, shaking it in its frame, making her jump. She spun around and Castle had already pushed his way inside (she hadn't locked it? why hadn't she locked it?), and he came to her and hauled her into his chest.

She collided with his body, losing her breath, and he gripped the hank of her hair in a knot at the back of her neck. "Did you forget that I feel that?" he growled. "Every fucking terrible thing you think about yourself. Stop. Just stop. That's the woman I love you're talking shit about."

"You shouldn't love-"

"I said stop," he roared.

She trembled, refusing to cry again, refusing to throw up, not here, not now. Not because she was fucked up - she had always been fucked up, always, there had never been a time when she hadn't been this broken. And not because he was holding her hard enough to keep her together.

"Baby, when I marry you - that's when - I'm gong to be the one asking, down on one knee, both of us filled with joy, not with regret and guilt. Neither of us hurt or sick or abandoning the other." She had a flash of something from him, his last mission, gone for eleven days when he'd promised only three. He was still carrying that? He had talked to her almost every day, he had been there. "When I marry you, Kate, it's because you'll know you can stay."

Her breath caught.

His hands gentled and cupped her face. "I'm going to make love with you now, honey. We're going to take back what's ours, ours alone. I'm going to kiss you, love, because I need you, and you need me, and we're in this together no matter how much we can't seem to stay."

He thought doing his job was leaving her.

She was - stunned.

His lips touched hers and sparked, an electric current down to her toes, curling back up to her belly and tightening her guts. She groaned and stepped into him, sliding her arms around his torso, feeling his bare skin hot against her, melting her down.

She felt him flush through her, the synchrony of their souls rubbing the same space. Her mouth opened to his and his tongue stroked smoothly, unhurried, none of the violence and possession she had craved, but the tenderness that always bewildered her.

She was stunned by him.

He wanted to make love.

She could do that. She could give him that.

Her fingers traced soft designs at his bare ass and he moaned her name.

She could do love.

\-----

Every time he saw another bruise on her hips or the bloodied bandages over her forearms, the fury rose in him with cold and deadly intent, threatened to swamp him, drown him.

The dangerous kind of rage, the kind that drove him to hurt. Hurt like he’d been hurt.

And he absolutely could not do that to her.

Sometimes he could, and she soaked it up like some nihilist flower soaking up darklight. 

But not tonight, not after-

It was so damn difficult to keep from thinking about it. Obsessing over every little detail, the story, how it had happened, what she’d said and how she had looked, and what that fucking asshole had said in return, how he had touched her-

She gasped, arching, and he consciously had to gentle his kiss, sheath his teeth behind his lips, use his tongue. Her hands were docile - for her - her response entirely too passive for his liking.

She was holding back because she didn’t think she deserved this, holding back because she’d done that terrible thing.

He wanted her mindless and enslaved to him, not in control at all - he didn’t want her timid.

So Castle eased his hands under her shirt and cupped her breasts, avoiding her nipples to caress the weight of her flesh, the line of skin at her sternum. She whimpered, shut her eyes and turned her head as if trying to avoid some kind of retribution.

But there would be no retribution this time. Not this moment, not this round. Later, oh, yes, later tonight he was going to make her beg for mercy, but right now, here this morning with the sunlight filtering in behind him and creeping across the tile floor - he was going to make her fall to pieces, slow and easy and devastating.

“Castle,” she whispered, her hands fisting at the small of his back. She squirmed as he lightly traced designs at the outside of her breasts. “Castle.”

She wasn’t asking for it; she wasn’t directing his touch either. He wasn’t going to stand for that; he wanted her to forget what she’d done last night, wanted her his again.

“Tell me,” he husked, nipping at her bottom lip and tugging it with his teeth. She sucked in a fast breath and clung to his hips, the tops of her thighs brushing his own.

“Tell - you?” 

“What you want, how you want it. Tell me how it feels to have my hands on you.”

“So good,” she whimpered, her forehead crashing into his chin. She was gulping for breaths. “So - insane, it makes me insane, I can’t stand to not have all of you-”

It was like a switch had been flipped.

He went from burning certainty to divine revelation: he was holding himself back from her like this, not her. He was the one withdrawn because he had complete mastery over his body, his senses, his wants - and she needed him to lose it.

She needed him to trust her enough to relinquish the reins and fuck her senseless.

“You have all of me,” he growled, swiping hard across her nipples. She cried out and came up on her toes, clutching his biceps, her eyes fluttering open. He ripped the shirt off over her head and threw it to the floor, and then he grabbed her thighs and roughly prompted her.

Kate bounced on her toes and jumped him, her legs opening to wrap around his waist, her bare sex grinding against his abdominals. She moaned and clutched at him, arms tight at his neck, her breathing fast.

Castle crushed her body to his with an arm and turned them around, slammed her back against the shower wall. She gasped, eyes flaring wide, and he gripped her thigh and pried it open, pushing her knee up nearly to her shoulder.

Kate groaned, her lids fluttering but her eyes fighting to remain locked on his. He kept her thigh there with the press of his chest, leaning hard into her to not let her touch the ground, and then he worked his hand down between them.

His first swipe through her sex released her arousal, fluids thick and coating his fingers, sticky-slick and amazingly wet for him. And it wasn’t the wash - he knew what a needy kate Beckett felt like.

She rocked into his hand, hips jostling his fingers, her body writhing against the wall. With her other leg hooked at his waist, it made the space tight, and intimate, and her arousal was soaking his pubic hair, coating his stiffening cock. Looked fucking amazing, looked right, only him, only him.

Her eyes chased his and when he came back to look at her face, she pressed her hand to his cheek, blinking fast. Like she might cry.

This was love; this was love for her.

He thumbed her folds and scraped his nail at her clit and she jerked, mouth blooming open in a round surprise. He slicked himself with the juice from her sex and guided his cock to the tight lips of her curled slit.

She whimpered when he teased her clit with the broad blunt head of his cock, her inside thighs shaking, the muscles quivering where he had her leg pushed up. He turned his head and bit her inside thigh.

Kate moaned.

His thumb angled to penetrate her and her hips bucked, seeking him. 

It was time.

“You have all of me,” he hissed, pumping his hips. His cock sank deep on the first thrust and she clamped around him, as if in invasion, her eyes wide and wild and so damn hopeful.

He fucked her against the wall like she needed it, like he needed it, until she keened his name and came in a terrible transported silence.

He was still hard. And he wanted her again already.

\-----

She was still trembling and weak when he brought her away from the wall, lowering her leg until it didn’t cramp so badly. She thought, for a panic-soaked moment, that he was pulling out of her, undone and unwilling.

But instead, he scooped her off her feet and carried her over the threshold into the motel room.

He wasn’t a cavalier man. He had done it purposefully.

She fought back tears that were too easy in coming, tightened her arms around his neck even as he lowered them to the bed. But he didn’t seem to have any plans of leaving; he pressed her down into the mattress and settled his full weight on top of her. Her lungs were pinched, her pelvis was being ground down by his, her ribs unable to expand, and it was the feeling she had craved since-

forever.

Since Wolf had bitten Wyatt and then cowered behind the couch, whining in shame. Since her heart had leaped into her throat and refused to come back down again. Since she had abandoned her five year old sons in the house alone to call their father while she escaped out of her own skin.

And now he was putting her back inside herself.

“Please,” she whispered, watching him as he settled harder into her.

His hands lifted (oh, fuck, the feeling of him was so heavy on top of her) and he took her by the wrists, unwound her arms from around his neck. She panicked, thinking he was going to leave, but he only raised her arms over her head and pressed the backs of her hands into the mattress.

“Stay,” he growled.

“Yes,” she cried out, her whole body rolling up into his. His hands left her wrists and came down her body, skimming, enflaming, touching. When he got to her thighs, he shifted to one side and widened her up for him, pressing her leg back and open.

She mewled, feeling vulnerable and defeated and wanting, and she couldn’t help gripping his arm with a hand in hurry. Castle’s eyes snapped to hers and he grabbed her by the wrist, yanked her arm back over her head.

“Naughty.” He lowered his head and bit her nipple.

She screamed, arching into him, and he laved across the broken flesh with his tongue. She was shaking, she was shaking, and he was drawing a lazy trail down her belly to her sex.

“Oh, God, oh, God,” she cracked.

He paused, hovering, until she could drag her gaze down to him. He shook his head slowly. “You don’t get to talk unless I ask you a question.”

She stared at him, but the words never came anyway.

“You don’t touch me unless I tell you. You don’t move unless I tell you where. And, Beckett? You don’t come until I say you can.”

She opened her mouth to agree - all she could manage anyway, just yes please yes - but he cocked his head and acted like he was listening very closely.

She shut her mouth, chest heaving she was so breathless, and she could see him just beyond her own rising breasts, see the dark and deep well of his pupils, how they had swollen to take up his whole iris.

“No coming, Beckett,” he said warningly. “Or I’ll have to punish you.”

“Please.”

“Ah-ah,” he tsked, and then his hand stung sharply at her flank, the skin burning and rippling from his slap. “I said no talking. If you can’t remember that, this won’t go well for you.”

Oh, God. 

He was going to break her.

She wanted, more than anything, to be broken for him.

\-----


	4. Chapter 4

He watched the heave of her body as she fought herself for control, lips pressed tight and her hands in fists against the headboard. He stroked her thighs and gripped her hips, touched a kiss to her navel.

She whined low in her throat, clearly trying to hold it back.

He bared his teeth at her skin and nipped. She shuddered and rose up under him, her body like a wave.

“This is what happens when you disobey me.”

She squirmed under him and he grazed his lips along the curve of her pelvis, nudging his nose into the heat between her legs. 

“You thought I would what? Beat you? Use you like he did?”

She whimpered, her eyes flashing open.

He kept her gaze and then dipped his head, touched his tongue to her navel, curled along the edge.

“Please, please-”

He pinched her inside thigh and she gasped, silenced. “You don’t get to beg, you don’t get to decide, Kate. That’s how you must want it, why else would you have let him fuck you?”

“No,” she moaned. “I want you-”

Castle bit the harsh jut of her hip and she jerked, her knee coming up and catching under his armpit. 

“You said a question, you said to answer questions-”

“Hush,” he growled. “It wasn’t a question. It was fucking rhetorical. Don’t argue with me.”

She growled back and he lifted on his elbows, grabbed her by the hip and flipped her around, unmercifully. She grunted in response, tried to struggle up to her hands, but he knocked her arms out from under her and pressed his body to her back.

She froze.

“Is this what you want?” he hissed. “Answer me.”

“I-” She writhed under him.

He shifted just enough to spank her ass and she went still, shoulders hunching.

He opened his mouth at her shoulder blade and bit, his tongue curling hard under her bone. His lips flattened to her skin, softening his kiss before he let up. Head lifting. She had put her face into the mattress, shaking.

“If you want to be abused, you come to me. Do you understand?” He gripped her hair and lifted the back of her head. “Answer me.”

“Come to you,” she whimpered.

“You want abuse, you want to be fucking used, I can use you.”

She shuddered again, swallowing hard, eyes closing. 

He leaned in over her, crowding her, kissing the shell of her ear. “I can love you, Kate, the way you need to be loved,” he whispered. “Even if it’s like this.” 

He dragged his hand up the outside of her thigh and squeezed her ass cheek hard, pushed two fingers in against her. She gasped, and he dug deeper, curled his fingers inside that tight ring of muscle, brutal, not letting up. Her body rocked against the mattress, rubbing fruitlessly, struggling against or with him.

“I can fuck you senseless and drag you home with me, if that’s what you want.”

“Please,” she moaned.

He withdrew his fingers and spanked her ass again; Kate shouted and bucked against the mattress-

and he realized she was falling into orgasm, practically sobbing in her release while he was still hard as a rock.

Time to change that.

Castle lifted to one knee, grabbed Kate’s thigh and spread her legs. She sobbed his name as he cupped her sex, her body curling as if trying to get away from the sensation. Her fingers gripped the sheets but he stroked hard against her clit, prolonging her orgasm, and then he wrapped his hand around his cock.

“My turn,” he growled, and then shoved his way inside her.

\-----

“Answer me,” he snarled.

She whined into the back of her hand, spread eagle face down on the bed, his cock ramming hard inside her.

“Answer me.”

“No,” she cried out.

“And when he touched you, when his hands grabbed your breasts, did you make that same sound you make for me?”

“No,” she sobbed, trembling under him, feeling the heavy force of his cock inside her, deeper inside her. She couldn’t move; he had her pinned, his thrusts shallow and thick.

“Better not. Only for me-”

“You-”

His slap made her groan, the hot sting of his hand against her ass. Her skin was burning, the blood coursing through her and pounding in every extremity. Her body was being pulled inside out. For him.

“Do you need me to tie you up, put a gag in your mouth so you’re forced to obey me?’

She moaned, dark liquid desire pouring through her.

“Do I have to grind you into a brick wall to make you mine?”

“No,” she sobbed. Tears streaked down her cheeks and soaked the sheets, the force of his thrust with every word, the force of him, how he covered her everywhere, all around her. 

His body bucked into her and she moaned, trying not to contract around him, trying not to come.

“Don’t you dare come,” he growled. “Not until I say.”

“Please,” she whimpered.

He spanked her, the burn of his palm against her so that she could feel the individual impressions of his fingers. When she squirmed, he did it again, punishing her. “I said no talking, Kate. You’ve already been punished once for coming without permission. Do I have to teach you another lesson?”

She didn’t fall into that trap, kept her mouth shut, her throat tight with the feeling of him, how he loomed. The welts on her ass stung with the sweat of them, the pulsing pain feeding into the deep, dark sensation of his cock touching her in places no one else ever had, ever would.

“I could fuck you all night, Kate.”

She sobbed, choking on it, like his cock was in her mouth, down her throat, so deep did he push inside her.

“I could punish you and still be hard, never come, never give it to you at all.”

She was out of her mind; she couldn’t hang on. She was going to come, she felt it roaring at her, ready to devour her whole.

His mouth was wet where he touched her neck and she shuddered, a long terrible drag across every nerve ending until it exploded in her womb. She cried out, contracting fiercely around his cock, helpless to the intensity of it, the dark forever.

And still he fucked her, never stopped, his grunts in her ear, his breathing heavy and humid at her hair, cursing her as she came.

\-----

He had never allowed himself to do this. Never. She was too - infinitely - she was infinitely arousing, beautiful, precious to him, and dominating her was one thing.

Commanding her was another.

He had never shoved her to the bed and fucked her without pause, never held himself back from coming just to punish her. They had always been equal in this, the same, and he’d been so damn afraid to be any more like his father, to brainwash and manipulate and control-

“You did this,” he growled on top of her. “You brought this on yourself. When you fuck someone else because you can’t manage to stay, then you lose your leaving privileges.”

She groaned, limp and unresisting under him, still shivering with aftershocks, those little earthquakes that took her head to toe. 

“What do you think happens next time, Kate?”

She was wordless, blinking slowly, and he thrust a little harder, made her gasp, come aware for him again. He worked his hand under her body and kneaded her breast for another jolt of stimulation.

She mewled.

“That’s not an answer, Beckett. What do you think happens next time, when you panic and you can’t stay?”

“I - don’t know,” she gasped.

“I’m gonna have to fuck it out of you,” he growled. “That’s what happens.”

She moaned, shuddering hard around him, and he had to grit his teeth to stave off the orgasm that was chomping at the bit to escape.

“I’ll have to fucking handcuff you to our bed - our bed - and fuck you until you can’t move.”

“Oh, God.”

“That wasn’t a question, sweetheart.”

She cried his name and he twisted her nipple in punishment and reward - it was both, and they both knew it - and then he gripped her tighter, pulled her back into his chest. 

“I know you can’t stay,” he whispered, touching his lips to the shell of her ear. He rolled to his side, bringing her with him, and he stroked his fingers down her thigh. He slowly pulled her knee back behind his, opening her for him, and he rocked his hips into her. “I know you need to go, I know how it takes you, love, wild and untamed and beautiful.”

Tears streaked her face, but she brought her hand back to the side of his face, cupped his jaw. He kissed the inside of her wrist, rocking his hips again. He couldn’t move much this way, but the thick head of his cock was pushing right against her g-spot, ramping her up again.

“I know you want to stay,” he sighed, softly kissing her pulse. “I know you’re trying for me every day, for our family.”

“I love you,” she gasped, arching, her body taking up his rhythm now. “I love you, I love-”

“I know, I know.” He turned his mouth against hers, swallowing her desperate words. “But do you love me enough to keep trying?”

Kate ripped out of his arms, untangling legs and fingers. He fell back to the mattress, his cock impossibly raw, throbbing without her, but she came over him, laying her body over his and spreading her thighs over his hips.

She found him first, fingers cool and lovely around his cock, and she did the work of guiding him back inside her heat. He groaned at the feeling of her surrounding him, and then she cupped his face, made his eyes open to look at her.

“Sit up with me,” she husked. Her voice was cracked and broken from screaming, from crying.

He rose, sitting upright and wrapping an arm around her back, fingers splayed at her shoulder. She kissed him, tongue stroking, and it made him draw his knees up to brace her. She rose on her knees and swiveled her hips, and he moaned in her mouth.

“Love me,” he begged.

“I do,” she mouthed. Her hot kiss worked down his neck, her hands rubbing his chest, thumbs over his flat nipples. “Now come inside me, Castle. Make me yours, only yours-”

He roared with his climax, rutting into her with the force of his need, his desperation, bewildered by how she’d turned him inside out so fast.

\-----

He kissed her, his hands cupping her face, kissed her as the last of her own orgasm fluttered through her body. His thumbs stroked under her eyes and back around her ears, sipping from her mouth. She felt him everywhere, how he surrounded her, and she curled herself into his lap, sinking in close.

Castle put her back, just enough, pushing her away so that her eyes were forced to meet his. She whimpered, wanting against him, the heat of his skin, but he wanted to see her.

“I’m sorry,” she said. And she knew it was the last time she’d say it, that it was done, and he wouldn’t want to hear it from her again. “I panicked, and I wanted to hurt myself, and I know it hurts you when I do that. I didn’t mean to - have it be between us. I meant for it to be the end, but I couldn’t go through with that either. I’m sorry for that.”

“For not being able to go through with it, or for doing it in the first place?” he growled. “Because if you’re sorry for not being able to go through with it, I’m going to have to teach you another lesson, all over again, Kate Beckett.”

She shook her head, surprised at how she felt her lips twitching, how she could be at all amused after last night. But he was - he was serious and now not serious too, both of those things. More like normal. “While I quite enjoyed being taught a lesson-” Kate took a breath. “I’m not sorry for calling you to rescue me. Save me.”

His face was so serious; he wasn’t smiling now. “Have I saved you?”

She hunched her shoulders and canted forward, leaning into his body, so damn grateful she was still allowed this. “Something is different,” she whispered. “Something has changed.”

“For the better?” he asked. His hand came to her hair and he sank his fingers deep, gripped her neck. “Is it better now, Kate, because I need - I need this to never happen again. I can’t-”

She shivered, drawing her arms tighter around him. “I know,” she whispered, squeezing her eyes shut. “I... want to say yes, I’m all better, I can control-”

“I know, I know,” he groaned. “But - changed? How? And-”

“I just-” She sighed and curled her knees up, squeezing his ribs where she could sit closer, his cock still buried inside her. He wasn’t moving, but she could feel he was ready, that he still wanted her. “I love you.”

“That hasn’t changed, Kate.”

“No,” she admitted. “I’ve loved you the whole time.”

He grunted, pressed a kiss to that spot just before her ear. “The whole time?”

“Since - I saw you,” she murmured. “Since you came into that room and said I’d done you a favor, looking at me like I was real.”

“The whole time,” he hummed, his thumb and finger massaging the base of her skull. His kiss touched her ear and she shivered again. “You loved me the whole time.”

“Yeah,” she whispered. “I - really - I meant it when I said I wanted... when I asked you to-”

“Hush,” he said. “We’re not doing that now.”

She nodded against him, but at least he knew she hadn’t just been desperate to connect with him again, desperate to have him. She hadn’t been trying to manipulate things, not really. She’d been honest.

Not now. But. Eventually?

Castle’s lips brushed her jaw, a caress that made her toes curl and her sex clutch around him. His hand at the back of her skull tightened in response. “One more time,” he murmured to her. “One more time for me.”

“Of course,” she breathed, rocking her hips against him. She wanted - anything. “You don’t have to ask-”

“I’m not asking,” he growled. 

But he had been, and she loved him for that too, and she wished he would just take, take it out on her body, take it out of her body, what she owed him, what she owed them both.

He rolled them, pushing her back to the mattress, and she let her legs fall open, her body welcome him. He gripped her wrists and tugged her hands over her head once more, pressing his forearms to hers so that he had her pinned. She moaned and thrust up against him as best she could, and his mouth sealed over her breast.

“Oh, God-”

He bit her flesh, licking the break in her skin, came to her nipple. He suckled hard, and she shuddered, but her insides were liquid heat, liquid, like his every thrust was rearranging her guts. He was brutal still, and her bones were cracking, and she couldn’t move, couldn’t do anything other than take it. Her body ached for him, and he growled her name, cursed her name as he fucked her.

Just as before, he wouldn’t come. He hadn’t come; he seemed to go on and on forever. Without-

Oh.

He needed her with him.

She clenched her inside muscles and gripped him, winding her legs around his back. He moaned something at her breast and lifted his head, his next thrust going deep as he stared at her. She caught the side of his face and lifted her hips as he withdrew, chasing him. 

“I need you,” he groaned.

“I’m here,” she insisted. Her hips rose again, finding his rhythm, and his lashes fluttered like he could barely hang on. “I’m here. I love you. I’m here.”

His eyes squeezed tight, and she angled his mouth up to hers, kissed him until he was whispering her name, chanting her name as his hips rocked incessantly, intensely, as if he wanted deeper inside her.

He wanted her with him, and she needed desperately to come for him.

“Castle,” she panted.

“Please, Kate-”

“Castle, touch me-”

His hand dragged at her hip, fumbled between them. She arched hard when he touched her, gasping his name, and then she was flying, soaring, her orgasm blooming brilliant behind her eyes.

“That’s it, baby,” he groaned, and then he followed, his climax matching hers, his body spilling itself inside her, over her, within her.

She lifted shaky arms to his head and wrapped them around his neck and the back of his skull, turned her lips into his skin and breathed him in.

“I love you,” she whispered. “Love you enough to try.”

\-----

He was spending the dark time to fight the urge to cry, still buried to his balls inside her, but everything loose and beginning to cool. Everything but the burn in his eyes and the knot in his heart, the roughened place where this felt like a hole with a bad patch job.

He still thought about himself like a machine. A break down in the machinery. Needed a patch, a metal plate to smooth it over. But he was human now, and he was rusting up the works with blood and sweat and tears, and he was just doing his damnedest not to cry.

It was harder when she held him like this, held him like she possessed him, like she owned him. She did, but it was almost easier when she was frighteningly independent, aloof and almost untouchable, when she made him work for it, because then they were two alphas clashing and sparking, they were more like two normal people.

Here and now, they were the lost ones, souls dark, mining for that vein that would prove each other worthy again. And he never knew if she'd find it in him, if she would keep finding it in him. Sometimes, the worst times, he didn't know if he'd still find it in her.

But he had. He did. And she rocked his body over hers, vaguely back and forth, an approximation that made it difficult to breathe through the clog in his throat.

And then his phone rang, a double-beeping shrill that made Kate withdraw, arms tucked in, knees coming up, her reflexive self-defense jerking into place. He pushed up on his elbow and gripped the back of her neck just long enough for her to open her eyes and breathe, and then he leaned over to the bedside table and plucked up his phone.

"It's Colin's ring tone," he told her.

"He - has the boys?" Her panic-posture unwound a fraction, eyes burning, but he held up his hand and shook his head as he answered.

She was not allowed near the boys right now.

"Col?" he said. He heard - something on the other end.

"Hey, brother. Kind of a situation here that only you can resolve. Apparently, my promises mean shit to my nephews."

He heard squawks of denial on the line, and then the phone was being handed off. Castle quickly got out of bed, stalked towards the bathroom. He didn't close the door - he had to be sure he could still see her - but he had to keep distance. Sometimes Wyatt over the phone...

Kid knew stuff he shouldn't. James was by touch, but Wyatt-

"Castle," she hissed, sitting up in bed, goose bumps across her flesh.

He pointed his finger at her. "Stay," he growled. She knew the rules.

A tense pause on the line and then it was James who came on the phone, James whom he hadn't been expecting. Wyatt was the spokesman. 

"Jay?" he murmured.

"Daddy, please don't send him away."

"James," he said tightly, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Please."

"James, this isn't the important part. You and Wyatt didn't tell me the whole truth. That's the important part here."

"You won't send him away?" James sounded just as tightly wound as Castle felt. "Daddy. Promise."

"You have to promise you tell me the truth. All of it. Whatever happens, you have to trust me to make decisions that are good for all of us. If I don't have the truth, James, then I don't know where the problem is, and I can't fix it."

"You have Mommy," James said. Knowledge, and not just because Colin had relayed his text message.

"I have Mommy," he said, infusing his voice with confidence. "I always have Mommy."

"I want to always have Wolf."

"You promise me I get the whole truth from you - even if it feels scary and too big - and I can promise we keep Wolf for as long as Wolf will have us."

"Whole truth, Daddy. Promise."

"Do I have Wyatt's promise?"

James made a noise. "One for all," he said.

Castle let out a breath. "All for one," he murmured, call and response. It did something for him he hadn't realized he had needed done. "James, I love you, and I love your brother. And I do love Wolf. He's not getting sent away. I made a mistake, bringing Wolf and Mommy to the city. We're going back to the fortress for a while."

"Oh. Yay!"

Castle rolled his eyes. "Put Col on the phone, James."

"Daddy, thank you-"

"I know, I know," he interrupted. "Everyone loves the fortress of solitude. Put your uncle on the phone."

"Daddy?"

He paused, hearing something in his son's voice. "What is it, Jay?"

"It's okay if Mommy is sad. We just want her. Right, Daddy?"

"Yeah," he said roughly, nodding his head even though his kids couldn't see it. He hid his face in his hand. "Yeah, we do." Before he could say anything else, try to reassure his sons, the phone was being handed off. 

"Brother."

"Col," he said, clearing his throat of it. "Pack up as much as you can and take everyone back to the fortress, would you?"

"Damn. Is it that bad?"

"It's - uh - she's okay. We're just gonna have to take some time getting back to them. So if you guys are on the road and we are-"

"Yeah, I get it. Might have to enlist James's help in taming in the wolf."

"He's still - wild?"

"A bit." Colin sounded bemused, which didn't bode well for Wolf. Might have been why the boys had wanted to talk to him. "Will you sign off on James using his magic touch?"

He sighed. "Yeah. Put him back on the phone."

The hand off was smoother this time, and James piped up with a childish little, hi, again! Giggling. So the boys were settled, at least.

"Hi, again, James," he said, chuckling a little. "Hey, my man, I told Colin you could help him keep Wolf calm while he drives everyone home."

"I can touch him?"

"Yeah, I'm saying it's okay. However - much you have to, James, but - damn. Kid, don't wear yourself out. Love you too much. Love you more than the dog. You hear me?"

"I'll only get a little tired."

"Don't worry about Wyatt and Col if you're touching Wolf. That's a rule-"

"I know, Daddy. Only one person at a time."

"Remember that Wolf isn't a person, kid. He's an animal. And you are more important than an animal."

"But Mommy loves Wolf."

He growled and rubbed a hand down his face. "But Mommy loves you a whole lot more. And you know it. So remember that, please. How much more we love you than Wolf. Don't let it go on too long. If it - if Wolf has to run, and you can't bring him back, Colin will call me and he'll let me know where it was, and Mommy and I will look for him as we come through. We'll be following you, basically."

"Okay, Daddy."

"Promise."

"One for all," he chattered.

It sounded a little too flippant this time, but he had to trust that Colin would put a stop to the touching if James looked sick.

"Hey, brother. Thanks. That will help."

"Listen, Col. Just. Fuck. Before the kid slips into a coma this time, yeah?"

"I will. I know. Damn, I do not want to see that happen again. Scared the fuck out of me last time."

"All of us," he gritted out. He hung up, because that's what they did, and then he tried to breathe enough to keep it together for Kate.

Things couldn't touch. Not right now.

\-----


	5. Chapter 5

She watched him come back into the hotel room with that particular slump to his shoulders. She was frustrated by how he kept them apart, but she was also grateful. She was sure her emotion would transmit to Wyatt over the phone - he did that somehow - and she sure as hell didn't want the boys knowing this. Feeling it like she felt it.

"What's-" She almost asked what was wrong, but how fucking stupid could she be?

Castle sat down on the side of the bed and put the phone back on the nightstand. "Boys were worried about Wolf. If I was going to put him out." He let his hands dangle between his legs, still completely naked. "I promised I wouldn't. And I told Colin to pack up as much as he could and head for the lake."

"The fortress of solitude," she murmured. Just the name they'd given it made her tension unspool, and she was ashamed of that too.

"We'll follow in the-" Castle glanced back at her. "Do you - have the keys?"

She opened her mouth, closed it. 

He rubbed his jaw. "Do you know where it's parked?"

"I... think."

"You were pretty drunk. You're still not entirely sober, are you?"

"Not entirely," she admitted. She didn't have a hangover - she had a panic attack - so she must still be liquid a little bit. "Hard to know with the - um - the panic attack crowding out everything else."

He nodded, like he was used to it, and she knew he was. How depressing.

Kate curled her knees up to her chest and laid her chin in the valley they made, closed her eyes. She worked on breathing despite his distance, breathing despite her boys calling and her not allowed to talk to them. 

His hand landed on her ankle, squeezed. "We have time," he told her. "We'll find the car. Fuck the keys; I can retool the lock and install a new onboard nav, in case someone ever does find them."

"Yeah," she said, speaking into her thighs. He was patient, and she was a mess.

His thumb traced around her ankle. "Don't close up on me."

She lifted her head, swiped at the tears running down her face that she hadn't wanted to show him. He tilted his head, studying her, and she let him see.

"I - uh - I have some issues here, Kate," he told her. His hand still on her ankle. "This touches on some issues of mine I hadn't quite realized were so awake."

"Issues," she got out.

"Being - left behind in the mess."

"I did that to you-"

"No, my - mother - my mother did that to me." He cleared his throat but he didn't drop his gaze, letting her see it. She was entranced by the darkness reflected in his pupils, nearly obscured by the bright blue. But she saw it anyway; it was there.

"Your mother left you behind," she said, astonished by it. He'd never said it like that before. Only that he had no memory, that she was nothing more than a mark on his timeline.

"She abandoned me to him. However it happened, I don't know, but I guess that's not important, is it? We learned that from you."

She nodded stupidly. They had. Her mother had abandoned her to Coonan, dying, and even though it wasn't logical, even though it wasn't like her mother had wanted to do it, she was still the child. She still felt it like she had been abandoned at a critical moment.

Kate shifted and came up on her knees, slid across his thighs and into his lap, clinging to him, wrapping her arms around his neck. "You have issues," she murmured, still - delighted wasn't the word. She wasn't happy for him. She was - settled somehow. It made her settled. "You can have issues, sweetheart."

"I'm trying not to," he gruffed.

"I know. Aren't we all?"

He did laugh at that, and his arms untangled from between them, came around her body. He dropped his forehead to her shoulder and she felt his breath at her skin as he sighed. "We are. We're trying."

"We're trying," she whispered.

His arms tightened. "Don't leave me."

"I am trying, every day," she said fiercely. "I will never stop loving you."

"I know," he croaked. "I - really do appreciate that."

She laughed; it wasn't funny, but it was grave and somehow sweet. "I'll tell you over and over if you want."

"I want."

"I love you, Richard Castle," she murmured to the top of his head. She stroked the soft hair at the nape of his neck where his hair cut had grown out. "I love how you feel around me. I love your stories. I love your hands, and how you hold me like something precious."

"You are precious," he husked, his face still buried in her shoulder.

"I love your loyalty," she sighed. "You champion my cause, every second of the day, and you make me feel I'm worth it."

"You are worth it."

"To you, I am," she said. "And that might be the best I can ever - believe."

"You're worth it a hundred times over. Even if I have to - have do this again. Again. I'd find a way."

"I am going to try to prevent that from ever happening," she growled.

His head lifted. His eyes were still murky, but the blue was so blue. "We'll make a plan."

She smiled, feeling it prick her heart. "Yeah, baby. We'll make a plan." She brushed her thumb along his temple and back behind his ear. "Your plans are the best."

"I'm serious."

"I am too."

He wrapped his arms around her tightly, and he rose up from the bed, making her clutch at him with her knees. He moved for the lone chair in the room and he sank down in it, made her sit on his thighs, his legs slightly spread so that she could see him. He was serious. A plan right this second?

"Talk to me," he said. "Tell me what works, remind me what works, and we'll make a plan."

She let out a breath, and yet she did feel better, more hopeful, already. She couldn't promise him things she had no control over, but the plan - the plan she did have control of. 

Their plans always worked.

"Working helps," she told him. "Focusing on - on setting things to right. Organizing or cleaning. The boys to some extent, but-" She bit her lip.

"But other times they make it worse. Like this time. I was gone for too long and-"

"You weren't," she insisted. "You were fine. Castle, believe me when I say this - you doing your job doesn't put me in that place."

"Being gone?"

"No, I like it," she insisted. And the blushed. "I mean - I miss you, of course. But, baby, you called me every day, and you talked to the boys almost every night before bed on top of that."

"You miss me," he murmured.

She cupped his face. "Of course I do. But that's not what sets me off. I'd have - done worse if you were here. Pretty sure I would have - it would have been worse."

"Do you know why?"

"Added pressure to perform," she said automatically. Shrugged at him. "I'm - not so good when it comes to the perfectionist part."

"You are a fucking perfectionist, that's for sure. Kinda hot and kinky in the bedroom, not so hot when you're running away from us."

She bowed her head, drew a circle around his belly button, realized too late she'd done it just to see him flinch. To get a reaction she had control over. She sighed and leaned into him, laying her head against his chest. "I want to be good for you, perfect for you, because you deserve someone better than me, and I know that's bullshit, but I still feel it when I panic about - about me."

His hand cupped the back of her head. "So what can we do to minimize your feelings of worthlessness?"

She shivered. "I don't know. I can't - I thought if I could just handle the city, I could get a job and be useful for-"

"Oh my God," he whispered.

She sat up. "I know I didn't say anything about it, but you wouldn't - care, would you? If I had a full time job? I was going to start just - volunteering, fuck. Something where I can come and go, but I had this idea that if I could just get a handle on it, I could be part-time. Even - even maybe - maybe full time. Just be - be not me."

"You - never said you wanted a job," he husked.

"Do you - mind?" If he wanted her to stay at home-

Ha.

Castle had never once told her he wanted her to stay at home. He only ever said - and he meant it, she could see it in his whole body, feel it - he wanted her free.

"I can get you a job," he said quickly. "I know exactly the right job for you. Oh holy fucking hell, Kate. You're coming to work with me."

Her jaw dropped.

His face glowed. "You're my partner. In everything. Out in the field, every day, I want you."

"You want me to be a spy?"

\-----

She scrambled off his lap and stared at him.

He sat forward and snagged her by the wrists, which he knew better than to do, but she only trembled and let him. "Kate," he tried. "It's - perfect. Can you - imagine?" His heart was beating so hard that he felt like he couldn't breathe.

"You're serious," she breathed.

"You've been with me on the black ops team this whole time - so that's field experience. You've held your own with the joint task force, even when it was so fucking hard. I mean, that time in the Congo, baby, seriously."

"You're serious."

"I am dead serious. Come here, sweetheart, don't look at me like that." He tugged until she stumbled towards him, still that doe in the headlights look. "You're already trained. He trained you just as he trained me-"

"But you're super."

"But my team isn't," he said quickly. He was about panic - this was bad - he was so desperate to have her say yes. He had to shove that down ruthlessly; he had to absolutely shut it down. "Don't let me convince you if you're not interest-"

"I want to."

They stared at each other. Her mouth opened and closed again, her eyes wide, and he knew his ears were pink, aroused as fuck on top of it.

She slid slowly into his lap with a knowing glance, sat close enough to make him gasp. "I want to be with you," she whispered.

"Oh, God," he got out.

"I want to always be with you," she husked. Her hand found him, and his eyes slammed shut. He hated it when she did this; he craved it. "You want me out there with you?"

"I want you with me," he admitted. Needed her attached at his hip for the next however long, just to reassure himself. "And fuck, you know you're hot in that black combat fatigues."

"With a gun," she murmured. Lips burning his skin, hand caressing.

"And the knives," he whispered. His hips jumped into her hand and she hummed. He was dead; he was a goner. He was going to come in her hand. "Kate."

"You want me."

"Badly."

"As a spy?"

"Been - thinking it for a long time. How good you are."

"Yeah?"

"Oh, God."

"I could be - really damn good at that, Castle. I could be good."

His eyes opened, paying attention, and he cradled her face in his hands, her fragile eyes. "Yeah. You will be. You are."

She sat up straight in his lap, gripped his wrists where he held her, and her eyes blazed like kindling. “I am,” she murmured. “I’m good at the field work. God. I...”

He leaned in and kissed her hard, not just because his cock was throbbing and abandoned, but because she looked so vividly alive right this moment. So alive. He wanted it for her, he wanted it for him, and he stroked his tongue against hers trying to remind her of what it felt like to be on fire.

She groaned and her hand came back to his cock, mimicking his movements with her grip on him. He growled she pulled her mouth away, two of her fingers coming to his chin to push him back. “Let me,” she husked.

She was on her knees before he could deny her, and her kiss was caressing the head of his cock even as he fisted the air where she should have been.

“Ah, fuck, Kate,” he groaned. He hated it when she did this. “Not - an apology. No more - fucking apologies.”

“Not an apology,” she murmured, swallowed his cock deep into her mouth.

He shouted, his vice a barked command, but she ignored him, cupping his balls and working her tongue against his shaft. He had come hard a few times now, and he ought to be able to endure this, but fuck, fuck, her mouth. She could always fucking get him with her mouth.

Maybe it was because he couldn’t help remembering that girl who’d wanted to please him, who’d been discovering herself and who she was - by touching him as much as she’d wanted.

“Kate, baby,” he moaned, cupping her head in his hands. 

She came off his cock and licked the head of him, eyes lifting to his. “Make me,” she rasped. Her teeth were white but they were sheathed, her lips touching the head of his cock. “Push me down on you.”

God help him, he couldn’t keep away from her. He fisted her hair and nudged the back of her head; she came down easily, swallowing him, and then more of him, and then, fuck, fuck, all of him, her throat in spasms against him.

He groaned, pulling her back, feeling the way she gulped it down, the way her throat tightened and her mouth worked hard. His balls tightened and she had braced her hands on his thighs - his rule, she had to, had to be able to resist - but he began lifting his hips into her.

She moaned around him and he thrust a little more roughly to meet her. Her mouth down his shaft, her mouth around him, the feather soft tickle of her hair on his thighs, the inside of his wrists, the sway of her body as he drove her against him.

“Kate-”

She brushed her fingers over his balls - not fair, not allowed - and he had to grunt and grit his teeth, but it was no fucking use, fuck, fuck, he was coming.

He orgasmed so hard his head jerked back and hit the wall, but all he felt was her gorgeous, fucking hot mouth around him, swallowing every last drop of him, sucking and licking him clean.

\-----

Kate laid her cheek against his inside thigh and sighed, curling an arm around his calf. She felt better now, not perfect - never perfect - but she felt cleaned out somehow. She knew part of this was Castle, his feeling, and she adored that, feeling what he felt, how it felt to him, (and that was perfect, had been perfected over their time together), but it was also her own.

She was clean. Scoured by his rough love. By her need.

And yes, she loved him. She loved him.

His fingers sank into her hair, cupped the back of her neck. “Come up here,” he said, voice tender, adoring. She loved that too, and she lifted up to her knees, moved to stand rather than climb in his lap again.

She caught his hand as it tumbled from her neck, kissed his knuckles, and got to her feet. She tugged on him and he stood, though he wavered a moment, gripping her hip. 

“You’re good at that too, you know,” he sighed.

She laughed, shaking her head at him.

“What?”

“Castle,” she chided, leading him back to bed. Where he got in with her, clambering in after her and draping his body over hers so she was covered with him. She was on her side, practically pushed on her stomach, but she lifted her hand and scratched his cheek where his scruff was coming in. “You make me sound like a-”

“No, hush,” he muttered, talking over her. “You’re not. You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known. Grace and dignity and love.”

She went still, realized the shame still welled up. She sighed and tried to find a way around it, tried to drown in that feeling of his, tried.

“Kate.” He wrapped his arm around her, drew her body into his, his knee sliding between her thighs. “One episode does not make you unfaithful.” He wrapped tighter around her, pressing in at her back, his lips brushing her skin. He was warm where she was cold. “I have your heart. Your heart is mine.”

She grabbed his hand, wordless, tugged his arm between her breasts as she cried. She hated crying; she hadn’t cried like this since - since he’d first met her - but it just welled up and ran over. 

His fingers caught her tears, swiped them from her cheeks, from under her eyes. He was love itself, wrapped around her, and though she knew his anger wasn’t entirely appeased, that they’d have conversations about this for a while, he loved her.

“I love you,” he told her. “Love you for trying for me, even though it would be so easy to stop. Oh, honey, I don’t love what you did, but not because of how it hurts me, but because of how it hurts you.” 

“But I did hurt you,” she whispered.

“Yeah, you did,” he murmured. “I won’t lie to you. It hurts to know you couldn’t - choose me in that moment. But-”

“No,” she said, squeezing his fingers. “No, leave it at that. Leave it there. That - deserves its own thought.” She turned to her back and he lifted off of her enough to let her lie under him, his elbows braced against the mattress beside her head. “I couldn’t choose you.”

His head dropped, hiding his eyes from her.

She twisted her lips and lifted her hands to his face, cupped his cheeks to lift his head. “I chose you four years ago, Rick. I chose you then, and every morning when I wake up in our bed, I choose you again. But some - sometimes what happens-”

“I know,” he growled. He turned his face into her wrist, pressing his eyes to her arm. She clung to him, her grip in his hair. “I know, Kate. I know what happens.”

“Don’t let me off the hook,” she said. “Just because I was kidnapped. Don’t give me a pass just because I’m messed up.”

“I’m not. I won’t. I’m not.”

“You are. Don’t treat me like I’m wounded.”

“Why did it have to be this?” he cried out.

She blinked hard at fresh tears, wouldn’t make a sound to distract him if he needed this.

He growled and shook his head, still hiding from her, but he dropped down over her and buried himself there at the crook of her arm. “Why couldn’t it have been the damn motorcycle again? Why did I take you to the city where all this - this fucking - I can’t - can’t breathe sometimes thinking about you with him. Letting him.”

She cried, she cried and willed him not to move, to never move, to hold her down forever.

How she hurt him. How it flayed her open, bleeding from a thousand wounds. “I-” She couldn’t say she loved him, not now, not to this. But she could give him his own words back. “My heart is yours.”

“I always knew,” he mumbled. He lifted his head and his cheeks were damp. “I always knew because of this.” His mouth dipped to her belly and she gasped, felt the wetness on his lashes as his eyes closed. “You let me. You chose me. I got to touch you, have you. And I knew. It was special.”

She sobbed, pressed her hand over her mouth to hold it in, clutching at his head with her other hand to keep him there, keep him.

He dropped down, his cheek against her stomach, and his tears slipped down her skin, awash in grief.

\-----

He hadn’t meant to fall asleep. Fucking hell, God help him, he had not intended to pass out in the middle of crying.

He came aware with a gasp, clutching-

“It’s okay. It’s okay. I’m here.”

Castle let out a stuttering breath and turned his head to her, his jaw scraping at the rise of her ribs. Her face was blotchy, her dark lashes thick, eyes swollen from crying. He didn’t figure he looked any better, crying until he’d fallen asleep, but he hadn’t slept since Sunday, what with the mission overseas and getting back home to find Kate gone and the boys alone-

He dropped back down on top of her and said nothing, and she didn’t offer anything either; she just kept her hands at his head as if she had to hold his skull together. Maybe she was. He wasn’t sure she had ever seen him cry like this; he wasn’t sure he ever had before.

“Stay,” she murmured, and he didn’t know why. He hadn’t moved; he wasn’t sure he could.

He closed his eyes and felt the way his nose pressed into her sternum, his cheekbone tucked under her ribs. Her belly button was salty from his tears, a pool had collected that he licked out with his tongue.

She shivered and clutched him, her thumb at his ear, and instead of doing as she’d asked, he nudged his way down her body.

She had taught him this, and he only ever knew how to love her best this way.

He spread her resisting thighs and held his face against her sex, breathing in hard of the scent of her - she smelled like him, like the way they went at it sometimes, unable to help themselves, all night those nights he returned, all afternoon if it was the middle of the day. How she unfolded for him like a night-blooming cereus, the orchid cactus.

Oh, that was Kate. That was this woman - prickly and defensive and independent, but so beautiful, so open, given the right conditions.

She had left their home because she felt destructive and angry and weak, and he wanted to prove to her again how strong it made her, all that grief and heartache and trauma. How it had made her the only woman he had ever loved, the only woman to survive a man like Black, the only woman to have his sons.

All the others had died. And he had not worked through that either, and he knew it, but Kate was the only important thing in all of that. Kate.

He sighed against her, the creamy silk of her arousal and the musk of his own come, and then he spread her open for him with his fingers. She grunted. He suckled lightly at her folds, lapping her up. She keened and bucked against his face, and he had to press her thighs open with his elbows so he could keep using his hands.

“Rick!”

He had no words because she felt it best when it jolted through her like a shockwave, he had no words because she had - for one night - chosen against him, he had no words because his mouth was filled with her taste and her heat and her desperation.

He pressed two fingers inside her and she screamed, climaxing around his invasion.

Castle couldn’t stop. She wanted it, and he wanted it, and she was going to take it.

He flicked his tongue over her clit and pumped his fingers inside her, working her through the climax and over the other side again, bringing her right back up against the edge. She sobbed his name and her thighs trembled under the backs of his arms where he was forcing her open, and her pleading was incessant now.

Three fingers, his thickest, and now he curled them up inside her, scraping her front wall where it was grooved, where she felt it deeply. She writhed and tried to get away from him, weakly, the heel of her hand pressed down against his forehead in either a bid to shove him away or an urge to grind him closer, but it didn’t matter.

He wanted this. He wanted her. He wanted her to remember this.

She choked on a scream and came again, like a hiccup, a tremble of her body and her gasping breath, and now she was too far gone, she was whimpering please please please and splayed open for him, unable to fight it off.

He fucked her with his fingers for another few seconds, just to show her, and then he lifted his mouth from her sex. She let out a whining breath and he ignored that too, (oh, but he was memorizing every sound, every stage, every second), and he pressed his wet lips and nose and chin into her belly.

“Ah, fuck,” she gasped.

He scraped his teeth as he climbed up her torso, caught her nipple with a bite that had her contracting up around him. He slammed her back down with a thrust of his pelvis, trapping her to the mattress, and she rolled her head on her neck and stared at him with all the feral and untamed in her.

“Fuck me,” she said roughly. “Fuck me.”

He wrapped her hair around his fist and crashed his mouth into hers, and he didn’t need any introduction, no guidance, no teasing. Her legs were still spread wide and all it took was a nudge of his cock down, trapping himself between their bodies, and then a roll and thrust.

She groaned as he slid home. Her hands came to his back, her nails half-moons against his skin. She was breathing hard, lungs ragged, but her mouth open for kisses he didn’t have to steal.

She attacked his mouth and bumped her hips up against him. He rode her back down and thrust deeper, loving the wild dark current that ran between them, like pain made unbearable.

His heart was broken. She was taking all of his jagged edges into her body and bleeding for him.

He climaxed with a silent gritting of his teeth, his orgasm drawn out of his balls and pumping mercilessly inside her.

The end was messy and tangled, and she yelped in pain as he crashed and careened into her knee. He tried to lie on his back and got her knee in his kidney, and she whimpered and twisted out from under him and now they were two people lying face to face, sweat-drenched and love-rough, her eyes wincing and his cock flaccid, broken people.

Her hand came up between them and offered itself; he caught her fingers with his own, still breathing hard. She closed her eyes, flared them open again, but they fell shut. 

She was most likely exhausted. Panic attacks always had left her with nothing. He was honored by the last few orgasms of hers, back to back as they were, coming so late in the encounter, without any kind of foreplay. Honored that she loved him enough to try.

He brushed his fingers down her eyelids so they would shut and they did, and stayed, and then her body slumped into the mattress.

He played with fingers and he watched her sleep, and he felt the vivid anger staining the bed like sweat and semen, seeping out of him.

It would replenish, of course, but not right now.

\-----


	6. Chapter 6

He sat on the floor beside the bed with the phone against his ear, his forehead pressed to his drawn up knees, listening to Mark talk him down from the pain that wouldn’t let him breathe.

“Son, I know. I know it does. But you know it wasn’t personal.”

“Personal,” he said hollowly, keeping his voice quiet. She wouldn’t wake. Not after a panic attack escape. “How’s this not personal.”

“It wasn’t against you. Wasn’t about you.”

He knew that. He had known it every time she’d done a runner. But this time- “I used to believe that. I used to... it was easy before. It was just - finding her again. But this time.”

“Because it’s sex?” Eastman snorted. 

“You know - how it is with us. You know. It’s important. It - matters.”

Mark growled over the phone. “You wanna tell me how many times you’ve had sex with someone else?”

“None. I’ve-”

“Before her, you stubborn-headed mule.”

“Before her doesn’t count.”

“Oh, yeah? She ever say that to you?”

His mouth opened but nothing came out. 

“Right. You have ten years experience on her, and you think that it doesn’t count? That it magically goes away now that you’ve got your one true love and all that idiocy?”

He sucked in a ragged breath, some of the sting drawing out of the wound. “I... it’s not idiocy.”

“Ah, hell, Richard.”

“It’s not,” he insisted.

“Alright, fine. Carrie is trying to wrench the phone out of my hands. Woman. Let me talk. It’s not magic, Richard. Ten years you worked the field, ten years of a lifestyle that you yourself have admitted was rather deplorable.”

“Y-yeah.”

“And now you’re celibate with her, but you’re out in the field-”

“She knows I don’t. I promised her. She knows it’s not like that.”

“Yeah, when she’s rational.”

His breath escaped him; he was just whistling through his teeth, his forehead hard against his knees. “Damn - damn it.”

“It’s not your fault,” Mark said quietly. “Richard, don’t take it like that. I’m just saying there are a lot of issues when it comes to sex, issues that Katie never had a chance to resolve. You two started in on things before she knew who she was-”

“She was a mother before she knew who she was,” he growled. “She wasn’t some innocent, naive-” Castle banged his head against his knees and groaned, hearing himself.

“She wasn’t naive, no. But she was innocent, wasn’t she? You took her virginity.”

“Fuck.”

“Carrie told me. She told Carrie. We were worried about you guys for a long time, you know. And it’s not that we’re totally cool with it - we still think you guys rushed into a relationship with an intensity that is frightening. Obsessive. I-”

The phone clattered, something muffled, and Castle took a hard breath, trying to keep his shit together. And then another voice came on the line.

“Rick, sweetie, you ignore my husband. He’s a big bear.”

“Carrie,” he croaked.

“Ignore him. We are not in agreement on that part of things. What you guys have is necessary and beautiful, and you know I don’t go in for poetry.”

“Car-”

“Don’t speak, just listen,” she said quickly. “What Mark is right about is the idea that you’ve had some experiences she’s never had, honey. You know? And it’s not that it’s okay, it’s not that we’re saying we think it’s alright for Kate to sleep around. But she’s going to go through some growing pains as she matures emotionally. She’s not even thirty, and you’re ten years older than her, and she was a mother so young, sweetie.”

“Yeah,” he whispers. “But... does that mean that I - should I let her go?”

“No, Rick. Oh, sweetheart, no. But understand that it’s not you, it’s not you. She’s trying to work things out, and yeah, it’s in a really messed up way, but it’s only because she’s not really had normal.”

He shuddered a long breath out and closed his eyes. “My fault. I just-”  
“Not your fault,” Carrie said sharply. “It’s not your fault. You have given her the most stable, steady home - a safe place to land - you have gone above and beyond what any normal person would have been able to do.”

“Normal people don’t pick up their-” He swallowed hard and choked back the words that wanted to come out.

“No, normal people say fuck you and hang up the phone. But you drove out to pick her up, to give her back her safety, to help her put her pieces together. Don’t discount what you do for her. She’s there, isn’t she?”

“Yeah,” he whispered. 

“No, Mark, stop. I’m talking now. You had your turn.”

Castle huffed, trying not let his laugh fall into a sob; it was that close. He wanted to magically make this all go away, the hurt, the ache that went so deep. He hadn’t thought she could hurt him like this, that he could hurt for him. He’d spent all this time hurting for her, grief for what had been done to her and his part in it, and this was - new.

“Richard?”

“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, I’m here.”

“That’s all you can be, honey. Just be there. It hurts, and you’ll talk to her about it. You guys will talk. It will eventually lessen, and one day you’ll turn around and realize you haven’t even thought about it.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” she said softly. “You need us to take the boys?”

“No, I - Colin is driving them back upstate. We’re okay there. We’re gonna follow slowly.”

“Oh, good. Hang on, Mark thinks he has more to say.” 

He heard the phone being passed over and then Carrie scolding Mark, warning him to be nice. 

Eastman was growling something as he finally got on the phone, and he could picture them in the kitchen of the farmhouse, messing with each other. 

“Richard?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’m serious. Think about what those girls mean to you.”

“What girls?” The boys were rather loners-

“The girls you’ve used before. Or let use you. A mission, that’s all they ever were, a job. Now Katie’s had - a job - and she did her job and she wishes she hadn’t, that’s clear, but it’s done. It’s over. You need to see it as a job.”

And when she did go out in the field with him, when she was on a mission, what then?

Could he let her use someone else?

“You hear me, Richard?”

“Yes, sir,” he got out. “I hear you.”

He had some thinking to do. 

There would have to be rules.

\-----

Castle rubbed his bleary eyes and sat up, got to his feet. He shuffled into the bathroom and closed the door softly, for a moment distracted by the man in the mirror.

What a fucking pathetic waste.

What a damn waste.

He ignored his reflection and used the bathroom, steadfastly not thinking about it, and then he found himself stripping off his boxers and opening the shower curtain, stepping inside to turn the water on.

The cold hit him in the face and burned it was so icy, and he stood there and closed his eyes to it, let it sting his skin with its spray. His hands dangled numbly at the ends of his arms like dead meat, and his chest felt pocked with holes as the water washed over him. Ice. 

He had fallen into a frozen lake once, wrestling an enemy agent in Prague during a bad season. They had both been aware of the crack but locked in mortal combat, and there was nothing else to do but try to use it to his advantage. Which he had. His body, naturally several degrees warmer than most, had held out longer.

Of course, when he’d had to haul his ass out of there, clawing at the ice and feeling it break under his grip, everything crumbling, there’d been that moment of clarity this is how I die. 

Only he hadn’t died. He had finally dug his way out and onto dry land, stripped his clothes off and changed into a dry set in the trunk, sat in the car with the heater on full blast for two hours before he’d felt capable to drive to the airport.

He felt like that now, numbed through and through.

Machine not man.

He stood under the cold spray and let it do its job, let it numb him to horror and grief and betrayal until those were just words he was labeling things with, until the craving in his body for rest won out over the craving for pain, and then he turned the water off.

He stepped onto the tile floor, shedding water droplets, and he grabbed one of the towels they’d used before. It was still damp, not enough time had passed, but he had to use it anyway, wipe himself down enough to pull on his clothes.

Only the clothes were in a pile on the tile floor where they had been since they’d showered. His boxers smelled like stale sweat and desperate sex, and he found himself crashing to his knees at the toilet and vomiting until he gagged.

His whole body was shaking. He threw up again and felt dizziness swamp him, and he had to flush the toilet and lower himself to the tile, place his cheek to the cool floor.

He was overheating. Like he did when his elixir-enhanced blood was fighting to heal him, like the very worst times when the trauma had been dire.

He crawled back into the shower and opened the faucet wide, laid in the bottom of the tub while the water beat down on his back and numbed his skin once more.

He felt sick. He didn’t want her to see him like this; he didn’t think it would be good for her to know that he could be felled.

That she had done it.

\-----

When he came to, when he realized he had been staring fixedly at the off-white slope of the bath tub for longer than he could remember not staring, Castle roused himself from this stupor and sat upright.

He was in the bath tub of a hotel room where, four years ago, they had stayed while in New York tracking down Alex and stabilizing Kate's system. Four years ago, the same exact bath tub where he had dreamed, one night out of the blue, of finding her drowning in her own blood, her arms gouged to her elbows.

His breath caught.

Yes. This was better. This was alive. She was alive, and his gratefulness exceeded the bounds of his icy body, filled the whole room.

She was alive. It could have been - if she'd come to this, to last night, to that extreme of a situation and allowed it to happen, then it could have been finding her in a bath tub. It could have been that, and it hadn't been, it wasn't that, and God, she had called him on top of it. Something so bad, so bad, and she had opened her eyes - still in the middle of a panic attack - and she had reached out to him.

She had wanted him; she wanted him.

His lungs were clear, his eyes open, his head no longer throbbed. His mouth tasted like stomach acid but he could brush his teeth and that would be fixed.

This could not be fixed. This was life. But he didn't need the other; he needed her. Didn't have to look like everyone else's life, so long as it was life.

He saw that now, very clearly, in a way he had not for the last four years. Expecting to find normal, expecting to get her evened out again, stable, and ignoring all the red flags she had thrown up at every turn. Normal. She had told him to his face that she couldn't do normal after everything that had happened. She had said that he was the only one she could understand and feel equal to after being caged.

He had somehow assumed that opening her cage door and coaxing her out, petting her by way of therapy and program clean up and a fucking college degree, would somehow restore some perfect state, magically erase three years of abuse and mistreatment and fighting for survival. 

She was not normal. He was not normal. And they fit that way. But he'd been trying for four years to remold her into average, and no fucking wonder she had done a runner.

He was clear now. He had it back. He understood.

Castle dried himself off, going slowly to be sure he was - actually - still certain. No sudden movements, didn't want to upset the delicate balance.

But as he pulled on his clothes, he found that it wasn't a delicate balance at all. His boxers he trashed and went commando in his black fatigues, not much liking the sensation but willing to work with it until he could find something clean. She had appropriated his t-shirt at some point and that was fine, but he needed to find it so that he could run for supplies.

Her clothes were out of the question. Her jeans might be okay, but they reeked of smoke and alcohol and sweat, a hard night living in them, and now that they were clean, he didn't want them on her, touching her skin. Or his.

So he stuffed them into the trash can too. She was going to be pissed, but he was doing this for them. He found his phone and he called the front desk, negotiated with the clerk to hire someone to run to the store - he wasn't leaving her. When he hung up, he felt much better for the plan in place and the certainty of where he stood.

With her. Always.

Phone calls over for now, he stalked back into the bedroom and eased himself to the mattress at the headboard, leaning back against a starched-white pillow and settling in. He turned the television on, thumbed the volume down low, knowing she liked noise and distraction, knowing he needed the sounds of normal life.

Not normal, no. But their normal. Being themselves again, and not two wounded people. Habits and routines were important after this kind of thing, and he was ready to show her what happened next.

He listed it off in his head, building the new normal as he went: six-week training at the CIA camp in Quantico, which he would take himself under the guise of requalifying, then the six-week field orienteering course which they would do as a family because the boys would really love it and Wolf would be an asset, and then she'd get her star and be assigned a desk in his office, and he would hold her hand on the elevator ride down to their floor before letting go and assigning her task.

They would ride out on the first entry level mission that passed his desk, asset gathering or drop offs or information handling. It would be easy, but it would be a flight around the world and new places and she'd be so good.

Fucking hell, she would be so good at this. 

She would never be the manager of a shoe store. Never make it as the shop girl down the block. She wasn't made of the material that allowed for standing behind a register or making charming sales pitches. The stacks of a library could not hold her for long, though he knew they helped, and the halls of a school building would only close in on her.

She was free, and she was wild, and she was beautiful, and she would not be tamed by the world.

It had kept her alive in that facility, kept her sane and able to love their sons when so much was stacked against her. She had done this, and she needed to know it, believe it, feel it coursing through her, that power and strength.

And being a spy was the only thing that would give her all of that in the physical and immediate way she craved.

And now he wanted her again, he wanted her fiercely, and he wanted to feel it, dwell in it for as long as she made him - for the entirety of her sleep, he wanted to feel hard for her, certain for her, and wait here at her side for her to rise up and claim what was hers.

It was going to be good again. It would be good. He had no doubts.

\-----

She woke to the heat of him against her cheek and chest, realized she had curled up against his thigh, slung her arm over his knee like a body pillow. She hid her face against the dark material of his pants, stretched her legs out under the covers to press full-length to him. His hand dropped to the top of her head, heavy, and she bared her teeth at his leg, nipped him.

His fingers scratched her scalp.

She slid her palm up his inside thigh and lifted her head, finding his eyes on her. She pushed the heel of her hand to him, felt her heart stutter when she encountered his want, his wanting her. 

Maybe she was still afraid she had broken him, broken this. Maybe she was. But not anymore. 

She pushed up onto her hands and knees, shifted to straddle his thigh, kneading his quad muscles with her hands, watching his face. How lust settled deep in his eyes. How it partnered with love, as it always had, and became something more than both of them.

She rocked forward and came into his lap, leaned into him at the same perfect moment he reached for her. His hands settled on her waist and she kissed him, sliding her arms around his neck until their chests brushed. Electric currents under her skin, his mouth connecting them, her tongue looping feedback through her body.

"You're so hard," she murmured into his mouth.

"Waiting for you. Thinking about you."

"Could've woken me," she said, breathing against his lips and coming back for another kiss.

His tongue played with hers. His fingers wandered up her back and counted the knobs of her vertebrae. His mouth separated so his nose could nudge at hers. "More fun waiting. Imagining. Watching your eyes move in sleep, the shadow between your breasts."

"Touch me now," she whispered. "No more waiting."

"Waiting is good for the soul," he countered. His thumbs dusted her sides, rubbing the curve of her ribs. Almost where she wanted him, almost. "Waiting makes us hungry."

"I'm starving," she moaned.

"Wait for it," he murmured at her neck.

She groaned and tried to touch him, but his movement blocked her, kept her hot and bothered on the edge of things. His hands ghosted her sides and curled inward, skimming until the backs of his fingers teased just under her breasts.

"Why do you make me wait?" she whined.

"I'm making me wait. You're just a bonus." His lips touched her lips, dry, a little flick of his tongue to wet them. "You're always a bonus." His thumbs pressed into the ribs that framed her breasts, the swell of them resting at the backs of his hands. "Frosting."

"Frosting?" she mumbled, trying to find his mouth, more of his mouth against hers.

"Have my cake and eat it too," he grumbled. "Lick up all your sweet-cherry frosting. Mm."

She moaned, rocking into his lap, but he was holding her off, petting her, keeping everything so light her skin was crawling, on fire. She needed now, hurry, have me, but he was only cupping her breasts and trailing his kiss back along her jaw. Her shirt flirted against her nipples as she tried to rub herself against him, cat scratches that made her squirm.

"Touch me like this, Kate."

She growled, had to slow herself down; he was making her slow it down. She released the fistfuls of his pants, smoothed her palms out, felt his mirroring hers on her breasts. Her fingers twitched and his did too, pianoing over her nipples and making her gasp.

"Good, isn't it?"

"So good," she said, eyes opening again to him.

"Touch me, Kate."

She removed her hands from him, taking care to breathe, to slow her pulse, her heart rate, to dwell in here and now like he wanted her to. She unfurled her fingers and touched lightly at his collar bone, trailed around to his shoulders.

"Your skin is cool," she murmured, tilting her head as she investigated him. His hands hefted her breasts and she leaned into the feeling, her head dropping forward. "Oh, yes, that. Castle."

"Touch me, warm me up," he husked at her ear.

She turned her mouth to his and obeyed, remembered how to do this, how to be gentle and quiet, how to glance across his lips and tantalize his senses. How to let herself be the panther instead of the wolf, the wild cat that played with her prey.

Oh, yes.

She skimmed her nails around his trapezius muscles, met at his spine to trip lightly downwards. Her breasts ached, throbbing all over in the places he wasn't touching, and she leaned in, tried to, tried to make it harder, but he kept it light, easy.

"Easy, love," he whispered. His nose nuzzled her hair, his breath tickling her ear. She shuddered all over at the sensations of him, the heat and want and almost a kind of electric field that danced between them, pole to pole, arcing.

"I love you, I love you," she told him, fingers mountaineering his spine, descending to flirt at the waist of his pants, the rise of his ass where she could feel each warm slope. "Oh, you're not wearing any boxers."

He chuckled and his hands clutched at her breasts, made her stutter, her cheek knocking into his. He pressed back, and his fingers kneaded her flesh, gripping her just enough to give her another little tumble into the maelstrom.

"Trashed them," he murmured. "And your clothes. This is all we have until the desk clerk brings up my purchases."

"Didn't want them ever again anyway," she growled, let her teeth clip his jaw. He lightened his touch but dropped down her belly, laid his palms at her thighs, teasing. 

With her legs spread by the width of his hips, his thumbs danced and hovered over her folds, stirring her thatch of pubic hair. "I love this," he husked. "I love that its wild, that you don't shave it or sculpt it or do any of that fucking nonsense. That I see you as you are."

She shivered and frowned, her nose bumping his cheek. "Two reasons. Expediency and razor rash. That's-"

"Hush, baby. I said I love it. You say thank you or you kiss me, one or the-"

She kissed him, swallowing his idiot words, his bullying love, taking his tongue into her mouth and stroking it along her own, two cats rubbing. Two jungle predators pretending to be house-trained.

He grinned and his mouth came away from hers; she felt his thumbs slide down either side of her clit, through her fresh arousal, spreading it back over her folds and into her curls. "Ah, just like that," he smirked.

"What do you think you're doing?"

"Playing," he murmured. "I love to play with you."

She felt her breath leave her, the wonder of having him encompass her like he did, and she cupped his face in her hands (not his cock, which was what she usually did, would have done, but they were being careful today) and she kissed him for loving her.

His thumb nail flicked her clit and she gasped, knees clutching his hips, rising up and away from the pinch of sensation.

He laughed and his hands moved on, palming her thighs again, teasing her ass, and she knew she was in for it.

This was not going to be a fucking. This was - different.

She released his jaw and dappled her fingers at the sides of his neck, down his chest, and began to work at getting his pants off. She could be different. She could tease and tantalize and touch him until they were both sweat-soaked and needy.

She wanted that too. She wanted it.

She lifted her head and caught his eyes, stilled her hands long enough to have him draw back to her.

"Castle, I love you." 

"Yes," he said. "You do."

\-----


	7. Chapter 7

He let her push him to lean against the headboard, and then they worked together to pull off his pants. When she had dropped them over the side of the bed, she came back to him with an eagerness that made him smile, her breasts bouncing under her shirt.

He laid his hand on her thigh and scratched lightly. “Take the shirt off, baby.”

She grabbed the hem and pulled the shirt off over her head, flung it aside. She leaned in over him, bracing her elbows on his chest, and he lifted a hand, tucked her hair behind her ear. 

“Hey,” she said, tilting her cheek into his touch. 

He caressed her skin, the rough place where her chin had caught the brick wall last night. She sighed and lowered her body to touch his, breasts warm. “Hey, honey. What do you want to do?”

“Mm.” She caressed her fingers at his sternum and touched her mouth to his. “Don’t know. What do you-”

“No,” he murmured. “You, baby. You touch me.”

“Oh,” she whispered, sitting up a little, elbows digging into him. “Me.”

“Yeah.”

Her eyes dragged down his body and turned liquid with heat, but he caught the back of her neck and angled her head to his. She blinked.

“Go slowly, sweetheart. Make it last.”

“You... gonna touch me too?”

“Yeah, sweetheart. I’m gonna touch you.”

She nodded, humming, her fingers tapping against his chest, and then she sat up. Her hand trailed down his sternum and circled his navel, and his hips bumped up against that slow exploration. His eyes dragged to half-mast, but he returned the favor, dragging his fingertips at the tops of her thighs.

Kate let out a little sigh and slid over his lap, rubbing her palms up and down his chest. He cupped her hips, rubbed his thumbs into the insert points where her hip flexors came to her thighs. She groaned and sank forward, her hair skimming his chest.

“Feels good,” she mumbled. “So good.”

He dug his thumbs deeper, releasing those trigger points where stress built up, and Kate’s forehead crashed into his. 

“I’m - having trouble with slow,” she moaned.

“Yeah, love, you usually do.”

She shivered and attacked his mouth, demanding his kiss and taking more than he’d wanted to give. But he was always willing, and he let her be voracious for just long enough before he cupped her face and tugged her back.

She moaned and her eyes fluttered open. “Okay, okay, slow. Ye-es.”

He couldn’t help the twitch of his lips, but she lowered her head and kissed the side of his neck, sending a jolt through him. “Fu-uck. Okay. That’s-”

“Intense,” she whispered. Her teeth grazed him, her hands at his sides and stroking. She was right. Intense. His balls were coiled tightly, like he might come, and she’d only dragged her lips at his neck.

And her hair. God. Her hair tickled his chest and made his skin tighten. He wanted, very sharply, very urgently to fuck her, but he’d already made a point of slow, and he was a fucking idiot. 

Her mouth breathed hotly over his nipple and he grunted, realized he’d forgotten he was supposed to be touching her back. He cupped her ass in his hands and rocked her forward, just to hear that keening sound as her sex made contact with his pelvic bone.

“Oh, God, Castle, slow isn’t gonna work for me-”

“Me either, me either,” he growled. “Sit up, Kate. I need you.”

She let out a triumphant noise and straightened up, tossing her hair back, and she came up on one knee, caressing his hip with her hand. He watched her with hooded eyes, the flare of possession and lust, and he reached up and caught her biceps, held on.

She placed her palm flat to his abs and his erection bobbed at her inside wrist. He grunted her name and now she chose to slow down? Fuck. “Beckett.”

She cupped his balls and caressed. She trailed her thumb over the head of his shaft, split the skin with a roll of her fingers. He shouted and bucked into her touch, burning with it.

“You said slow,” she murmured, lifting an eyebrow.

“Thought - we agreed,” he grunted. “Fuck slow.”

Her lips twisted, holding back a smirk, and she did a neat little flip of her hand and ducked his cock. He bobbed again, groaning at the trick, but she was lining her body over him and teasing herself with the head of his shaft.

She groaned, hips rocking in the air, and he gave an involuntary thrust of his hips that made her grunt and collapse onto his chest.

He caught her, but she was already struggling upright again, only this time she wrapped her hand around his cock and guided him to her heat.

“Oh, fuck,” he moaned.

“Push inside me, Castle.”

“Oh, yes.”

“Rock your hips, baby,” she insisted. “Need you to-”

He bucked, unable to resist, and she cried out, her head bowing over him. Her hips worked, swiveling, back and forth to seat him, and he could only grip her hips and growl through the too-tight sensation of her clutched around him.

“Fuck me, fuck me, Kate Beckett. Fuck.”

She flared a dark look at him, and her hips twisted. He hissed as his cock sank deep, rose up to claim her mouth as well. Her kiss was wide open, mouth wet and hot, and her body began to rock against his.

“Oh,” she gasped. “Oh, yes. Yes. Castle.”

“You feel amazing,” he husked. “How deep I am inside you.”

She whined and bore down, and he felt her grinding against him, felt her clenching, tightening up. Her head bowed to his; he parted the curtain of her hair and cupped her face, stroking her ears.

She moaned and shuddered. “I can’t - hold off. I’m gonna come, I have to come, please come with me, come with me, Rick, with me-”

He growled her name and gripped her hips, began driving himself up into that tight, narrow channel. She was trembling, her thighs vibrating, her body humid with sweat. She rubbed his chest and came up to hold his face, her fingers scratching at his cheeks, through his scruff. Her mouth opened at his jaw and she moaned.

“I can’t stop,” she cried out. “I can’t-”

“Almost - almost there,” he growled. “Hang on. Almost-”

She gripped his ear and scraped her free hand down his chest, touched the place where they came together, her fingers slicking around his cock. He barked a command even he didn’t understand and then she fondled his sac, rubbing the skin back and forth so that it shot through him like fire.

He climaxed with a shout, felt her coming around him, and he held her pressed hard against his chest, rutting out the last of it as she contracted like a fist around him.

\-----

She was still shaking.

She might be for a while after they did this, every time, because it washed over her in these moments when the intensity ebbed and left her sated, and whole, and right. It washed over her what she'd done, and how he loved her despite of it, and she was shaking.

He'd asked her to go slowly, to make it last, and they'd barely made it fifteen minutes. She wanted only to be - no, she corrected herself, no, not be. Not be. To do for him. 

Therapy. She was - so tired of therapy. So tired of trying and failing despite all-

His hand came down heavy on her back, between her shoulder blades. His lips touched her temple. "One of my favorite parts. Feeling you curled like a cat over me."

She sucked in a laughing breath, surprised, and slid her arms around his waist, the space where the arch of his back brought him away from the headboard. Her warm man. She did melt over him like a cat in the sun, didn't she?

"You know when it's like this, right after, I can feel you," he murmured.

She sighed.

"Feel every regret, every time you think badly of yourself." His thumb bumped over her spine. "Why don't you feel me for a while? Let that wash over you instead."

"How?" she mumbled.

"I don't know," he laughed. "I - don't exactly have control over it."

"We really should," she said into his chest. She traced her fingers over his bare skin, felt it ripple. "With the boys getting older, needing - they'll need someone who knows what he's doing."

"Colin," he answered.

"Yeah. He's good with them."

"But you might be right. Maybe we should be getting a handle on it. Be purposeful." His sigh echoed in her ear. "But I don't - want to not feel you. I like feeling you."

She turned her face into his chest, took a moment, lips touching him, before she laid her cheek to his shoulder again. "I like feeling you too."

"It's reassuring, you know? You're still here, you still - want me like I want you."

"I do," she said, clutching him harder. "Want you. I always want you-"

"I know. But - feeling it from you like that makes me - I don't know. I guess we haven't really talked about this, and maybe we should have. How it is."

She was silent. It was always like this. He started conversations and then she picked up her language from him. He had long ago stopped trying to make her go first; she just didn't have the words for it.

"Be good in the field," he said, as if it had just come to him. "Damn. Be really fucking excellent in the field. I'd always know where you are, you'd always be able to find me. Well, within that range. I wonder without the boys close how far we can stretch it-"

"Not too far," she said quickly. She didn't want to stretch anything. She didn't want-

"No, not far like that," he said. His hand slid up her back and rested at her shoulder where she was turned into him. He scratched at her hair, fingers combing through to pull it back behind her ear. "I meant - we raid a warehouse for munitions, right? And you go left, and I go right, we place charges, but we both know - it'd be that steady hum of awareness. We'd both know the other one was right there, still there."

"Oh." Steady hum of awareness. Was that what it was? She tried it out in her head, prodding the words for meaning. "Like your skin pressed against mine."

"Like my-? Oh. Yeah, damn. That's a good way to explain it." His palm curved her shoulder, skin to skin. "And now, after we've been together, it's more like my skin is your skin, like the intersection of a Venn diagram."

She shivered and nodded, picturing it, the overlapping circles where they touched so intimately. 

His kiss pressed hard at the scar in her eyebrow, something he'd taken to doing after every bad time, like he was reminding himself of something, of what she'd already endured to be here. She didn't mind that, if it helped him; anything to keep him here, keep his love.

"Once we get back to the fortress," he said. "I'll check in with the office. I've been needing to do an overhaul of the training program - it's six weeks - and this will be perfect timing. While you do the course, I will too, undercover basically. Just test the system, see what needs improvement, where we're weak."

"Oh." Her heart had flipped when he'd said six weeks. But he was going to be there, undercover, and that seemed like a good idea. "Where will the boys go? Mark and Carrie's?"

"Yeah, I guess so. Colin..."

"I don't think he'd want to," she said quietly. "Six weeks is a long time. Where is the training?"

"Quantico. But, you know what? We have a campus in Connecticut that's actually pretty damn close to the Eastman's farm. We use it for the elite ops teams, but I'm thinking if I can give the school enough advanced notice..."

"Don't change it up just for me-"

"No, for me, too. Plus they'd have to think on their feet. Train without the usual crutches in place. Needs to be done."

"Are you in charge of training too?" He went everywhere, when he went, and it seemed like his job was more about putting out fires than anything else.

"I'm in charge of the facilities. Not the training. That's a whole school of - the politics is fucking insane, really. But I go in there, you and me together, and we can shake that shit up. I do a nice little report, a presentation to the Committee, and suddenly the CIA is awake again and not napping at their desks. It's good."

"You sound devious," she muttered, lips turned up.

"I really am," he hummed. Devious and so damn pleased with himself.

"It's okay that you have to go with me?" she asked. She pressed her elbows into her sides. "I don't think it's smart that I - do that kind of thing alone. The weapons training is fine, the academics is a breeze, but when it's hand to hand combat or the psych eval-"

"No," he said firmly. "You are not doing it without me."

"But it doesn't - I don't know - automatically fail me?"

"Why would that be a failing grade?"

"I can't do it."

"You can do it. I'm there to be sure no one else gets their throat slit while you do it. So beautifully, I might add, though I know you don't like to hear that. But, really, Kate, love, you have the best form, this flawless technique. You execute with such grace, a little flair of style-"

"Okay, okay," she mumbled, rubbing her face into his shoulder and hunching around him.

He sighed and combed his fingers through her hair, flipped it around his fist, one wrap and he was back to knotting it at her nape. She felt contained again, with his fist pressing into her, contained so no one could get hurt.

"You won't fail," he told her. "You'll exceed requirements in every level. Except, perhaps, the psych eval, if you don't open your mouth and talk."

She tensed. "We have to - have to get a cover. We have to-"

"Kate, Kate," he hushed, pressing his lips to her forehead. "Breathe, baby. You got this. It's the same as it's been. It's just you. Kate Beckett. The altered details are the shit you won't talk about anyway. You stand alone, sweetheart. Your life. Just the notable exceptions."

"Like the fact that I have twins? And you."

"You can still have me," he murmured. "You can say that. They'll know anyway. You're a contract worker with the CIA anyway, sweetheart. It's a lot less of a hassle than you think. We do this every day, scrub out the identities of the black ops agents who come through the program. It will be fine."

"No boys, but I can have you," she echoed. 

"No boys. We agreed. We said they don't get put on anyone's records, they don't-"

"No, I know," she assured him. "I don't want anyone having access to records somewhere-" She shivered, clutching him. "No. No boys."

"It's gonna be fine. Piece of cake for you. You're already more than qualified. After those six weeks, we have a six week orienteering course, but the boys can go with us. It's just some rough camping."

“I like the woods,” she said. She took a slow breath and his fingers dug into the cords of her neck, made her body release its tension. “Like that too. Yeahhh...”

His chest rumbled under her ear and he dug his fingers deeper into her muscles, the tendons that held up her vertebrae. “Better, baby?”

“Better,” she mumbled. Her eyelids dragged, but she was trying to gather things together. “Twelve weeks.”

“Yeah, honey. Twelve weeks altogether. Well, six to begin, then there’s a two week wait while they score the candidates, rank them. Then the six weeks of mountaineering. You’ll have to do these exercises, report back to base every so often. The boys and I will go with you, but we’ll sit back and let you do all the work.”

She gave a gruff laugh and snaked her arm around his neck, winced at the way the bandages on her forearm caught the edge of the headboard.

“Fourteen weeks, all told,” he said, catching her elbow and ghosting his thumb at her skin. “So almost four months. Probably, yeah, four months. Introduction week on the front end, and then ceremony and induction the week after the training is done. Sound good?”

“Yeah,” she said, playing the hair at his nape with her fingers. “Yeah, I think - I mean, it’s kinda extreme, training to be a spy when I was just shooting for holding down a job-”

“It’s not though. Not really. It’s a logical next step after what we’ve done these last few years. You’ve contracted and pulled down a salary from the CIA for the last three years anyway.”

She nodded. “I have but - this is different. This is an assignment from someone official, from - I don’t know - the President-”

Castle laughed, his thumb tripping over her spine. “No, baby. The President doesn’t - well, to some degree, sure. But the Director has authority over us, and I’d be your direct superior.”

“Oh. Yeah. Well, not so different then, you being the boss of me.”

He grunted, and she smiled, nudging down into his chest. Her fingers swirled in the short hair at his nape; she loved the softness of it, the silk of his skin. 

“Kate.” His next words were said hesitantly, carefully, and she braced herself for the end result, knowing it was serious. “I don’t think you’d be happy with a job in some department store-”

“You mean you don’t think I could do it.”

He sighed.

“I don’t - know that I could either.”

“Baby, it’s not that you can’t. It’s that it would take so much fucking effort. You’d be killing yourself just to keep steady for a four hour shift. You’d be on edge, waiting for that one little thing that might set you off.”

“I’m trying - I’m just broken in all these places and I-”

“No. No.” He gripped the back of her neck and pressed his mouth to her forehead. “You’re not broken. You don’t get to call it that. You’re my partner in all things, Kate, and the mother to our sons. Four years of work, but hasn’t it also been four years of life? Living, thriving, having fun together, doing good work, loving our kids, loving each other.”

She closed her eyes. “Yes.” Let out a long breath. “We have. You’ve helped me be - all of that. I don’t know that I’d have made it this far without you.”

“This far?” he growled. “You say that like this ends soon.”

“No,” she said immediately. “No, this doesn’t end. We don’t end.”

His hand rubbed down her back; she felt him pleased, rubbing up against her skin with that feeling. Venn diagram. “We don’t end,” he murmured. “You’re right, baby. That’s right. We don’t end.”

“You think I can really do this?” she said.

“Of course. The question is - do you want to? Or am I pushing-”

“I want to,” she said quickly. Breathless. It fluttered in her chest like hope. “I want to do this. I want to be good at something. I think I can be - Castle - I can be so good at this.”

His lips caressed her cheek. “You’re going to kick ass at this. And I’ll get to watch.” 

She grinned. “You want to watch? I can make that happen right now, sweetheart.”

\-----

“Lie down,” he told her, shifting her to the mattress. “I have a better idea.”

“Better than me getting to come while you watch?”

He grunted, giving her a hard kiss as he rolled them both. “Might be, if i do it right.” She was almost smiling - almost - but he lifted up because somewhere in him he was struggling against an urge to take her again. “Lie on your stomach, and we’ll see what I can do.”

Her shoulders hunched but he kept a hand at her spine and used his other to brush her hair away from her back.

“Arms flat,” he murmured, and she moved to obey, just that easy.

Her head turned, glancing at him. “My ass or-”

He growled and caught the back of her head, gripping her hair. “No. Kate. You are done for now. You had maybe two hours of sleep. Let me give you what you actually need.”

She sighed, but he needed to push her past the place where she felt she had to prove herself, where she was a little manic to please him. He didn’t want that - well, he did, and that was part of the problem - but he wanted more for her to stop pleasing him and instead find a way to rest.

If she kept on like this, anxious to fix what couldn’t and didn’t need to be fixed, she was going to fall right over the edge again.

He pressed his hands into her back and she grunted, her skin warming under his touch. He used this thumbs to work into the muscles of her shoulders and she actually moaned.

“That’s right, baby. All these knots.” 

Her lashes dragged down and came back up. “Just - panic attack.”

“Yeah, I know it is,” he murmured, leaning down to kiss her skin between his hands. “Let me help.”

Her shoulders slumped. He shifted to sit at her back, and she groaned, breath leaving her body in a long exhale. He sat back more at her thighs, giving himself room to knead the globes of her ass - more, really, for personal pleasure - but she had tension there too.

“How’re the hips?” he said, digging his fingers into her.

“G-good,” she grunted.

“Honesty, Kate.”

“Sorry, sorry - mean, I mean, my whole body - aches.”

He lifted to his knees and pushed back down a little more, settled to one side so that he wasn’t pressing her into the mattress.

“No,” she mewled. “I - want you more-”

“Kate,” he sighed, stopping the work of his fingers to lean in over her back. He touched his mouth to her shoulder, nudged his nose in against her chin where her head was turned. “Kate, honey, I’m not going anywhere.”

She closed her eyes. “O-okay.”

He stroked her hair back from her face, her neck, kissed her softly. “It’s over, baby. You believe me? It happened, but it’s done. It’s done. Now I want to make you feel good again, like you’ve made me feel good after all of this. Back and forth, like we always do. Trading off.”

“Yeah,” she said, her voice small. Like she felt she didn’t deserve it.

“You know how good it makes me feel, being able to love you, be good for you. You know I’m a controlling asshole-” he kissed her very gently on her eyelid “-and so these times when I can take care of you, baby, you know that makes me feel like a good man for you.”

Her hand dragged up the sheet and touched his neck where he was hunched over her. “I know,” she mumbled. Her eyes were sad, but he was going to change that. He was determined to change that. She touched her thumb to his lips. “I know you need to take care of me. I - want you to.”

“Then close your eyes,” he whispered. He caught her hand and kissed the base of her thumb, put her arm back down. “Close your eyes and let me dig out all these knots in your body until you can sleep.”

“Till I can sleep,” she murmured.

“Yeah,” he answered, stroking the skin at the corner of her eye and then back through her hair. “We’ll get a good night’s sleep - middle of the day - then head out after Col and the boys.”

“After I sleep,” she sighed. Her lashes closed.

He leaned in closely and set a kiss against her cheek before he sat up again. He stayed close to her side, unwilling to press her hips into the mattress, but not wanting her to think he was leaving.

He started at her ass, caressing at first, knowing she liked special attention paid to her only when it was about sex, and he was entirely willing to do that.

\-----

At first, all she could do was hang on to the facts of things, the statements of truth they had made to each other: she was in love with him; he wasn't leaving her.

Despite his hands kneading her muscles and digging deep into flesh that ached, despite her arms bruised and her body set along the edge of panic, she found herself ready to fall. One way or another, she was going to fall, and Castle seemed to be doing everything in his power to make her fall into him. Into sleep, love, protection, forgiveness and not-

Terror.

It was very close, all that terror, and she had been in it for the last two days, longer if she was thinking about it clearly, the terror of the future unknown, but now he held her down and forced her body to release.

It wasn't the release that reassured her, over and over again, that this was real, that this wasn't gone, that he loved her and she loved him and life could be good, but it was release nonetheless, and it worked.

Her muscles uncoiled their springs under his fingers, the heels of his hands ground out her tension. He used his elbows at the taut places in her shoulders and even the column of her neck was given his attention. Her skin warmed and heated, her body grew fluid, and her cheeks flushed.

After a long time, his work tireless and without end, unbidden words came to her lips and spilled out, words she didn't know she had, didn't know were even true until she said them.

"You don't want a spy who's always having a panic attack."

"Define always," he husked. His body was so close to hers; he gripped her deltoids and kissed the nape of her neck.

"Frequently," she amended.

"Define frequent."

"Castle," she whined. "You know what I mean. Freaking out and running. Can't be running when we're in the middle of a delicate operation in a foreign country."

"Kate, when's the last time you did a runner? It's been-"

"Two hundred and thirteen days," she mumbled.

He went still. She felt her shoulders drawing up, but suddenly Castle was pressing his body to hers, his chest to her side, her arm, her back, his legs tangling with hers. "Oh, Kate, honey. You keep track of the days?"

"It's - kinda automatic now," she muttered, her cheeks burning. "Um. Since the boys were born and I had to know-"

His palm cupped the back of her head, gently combing through her hair. His lips touched her eye, her cheek. "Oh, love, you break my heart. Don't keep track of the days in between. I don't want our life coming down to the numbers."

"I can't help it all the time."

"Keep track of the boys," he murmured, another kiss that made her feel heavy. "You used to do that anyway, then do it again. Switch back to them. Number of days since Wyatt broke something in the house. Number of days since James fell asleep in his breakfast-"

She laughed. A tight and choked thing, but it came anyway. And - she could do that. "Oh-kay. Okay. Yeah. Um, since James did fall asleep in his breakfast yesterday, he's at zero. But Wyatt hasn't broken anything since - mm - Wednesday."

"See? There you go. You number their days, sweetheart, but not your own. Never your own. Your days are precious to me, and I'll keep them. Do you trust me to keep them?"

"Yes."

His kiss half melted her, eased the burden in a way she hadn't expected. His thumb rubbed the scar at her eyebrow. "Still, over two hundred days since this kind of thing took you, and I think that's pretty damn good. Because those two hundred days have been good days, and not on the edge. Haven't they?"

"Yeah," she admitted. "Good days. I - well, that thing with the fireworks-"

"Startle response. I did too, remember? Fuck, we both hit the deck and brought the boys with us. They thought we were hilarious."

She shivered. Castle had reacted, just as she had, but she'd been trembling the rest of the night. Until he had made love to her under the shower spray and she'd cried and come harder than she'd remembered coming in weeks.

"Good days," she murmured finally. Two hundred and thirteen good days. They had been good days. "I really love you."

He hummed and slid his arm around her waist, turned so that his body was half under hers. She felt herself melt completely, her skin conforming to his, and he combed his fingers through her hair in that way that always soothed.

He drew the sheets up her back and cupped the side of her face, holding her at his side. "I really love you too, Kate Beckett. I really do."

She was warm, and she was so tired, and she hurt in deep places, wounds old and new, but he really loved her and she felt it everywhere.

"Tell me a story," she murmured, breath sighing against him. "About us."

"Last month when we were packing the boys' playroom and you found Wyatt's rag doll - that was one of the best looks I've ever seen on your face. Because he'd built a whole lego bedroom for that little doll, and put it to sleep on the lego bed, and drawn his own lovey blanket thing over it to tuck it in. And then he'd hidden it in the closet because - who knows why? - but when we found it and how obvious it was he loves that thing, despite sleeping with that stupid rabbit for years now, he loves that rag doll in a special way, a way that makes him want to honor it, and care for it, and you did that for him. You gave him the ability to love that way, because you modeled it for our sons from the beginning. I could see it on your face, in your eyes, how much it meant to you that Wyatt loved. The doll, yeah, but I think it was just the whole thing. Here it was, proof of how good you'd done."

She smiled against his chest, drew a hand in to swipe at the tears forming in the corner of her eyes. No need to cry. It had been so sweet, that rag doll of his that she hadn't seen in at least two years, but which Wyatt had been secretive over, and loving on, even though she hadn't known.

"Good day," she whispered. "Very good day."

He tucked the blanket around her shoulders though she hardly needed it with him under her and heating her up. "Yeah, it was." His hand rubbed her shoulder. "And they have been good like that. Think about a mission - I'm gone for three days, five, ten - that's so much less than two hundred, first of all, and secondly, Kate, a mission has instant release."

"Release?" she mumbled.

"You get to blow shit up. You don't know how good that feels."

She laughed, the sound tripping between them and smoothing out. "Yeah, I do, baby. We've blown stuff up lots."

"Oh, yeah. We have. See? You can do that. And you accomplish a set goal, not an abstract one. It's very good. Damn, I wish we'd thought of this sooner. I guess this has really been the first we've had time for our jobs at all. Outside of program clean-up."

"Mm." She closed her eyes again, and though he kept talking, talking in her ear about blowing things up and this one time in Marrakech, she was falling asleep. Lulled by promises and bright visions of the future.

She could do one time in Marrakech.

\-----


	8. Chapter 8

She did, finally, sleep.

She slept hard for four hours and when she stirred and came back to consciousness, her eyes fluttered open and she was smiling.

His heart spilled inside out, liked the seams had disintegrated, but in the next instant the smile dropped off her face and her eyes gaped like open wounds.

"No, no," he hushed, cupping her jaw. "Go back to smiling. You can smile. Good dreams, honey?"

Her lips twisted, as if caught somewhere in between. She curled a hand into a fist and took a shuddering breath.

"Please, baby," he whispered, nudging in closer. He hadn't moved in four hours, had held her and cried a little himself and planned for their future and he was feeling optimistic again, but he hated when she went so dark. "Tell me? Just talk. Just start talking and we'll see what comes out and we'll deal with it."

"I want to be happy," she gasped.

"Of course. Of course you do. You can be happy. We made such-" he almost said progress but that was a negative word now, that was wrong, that wasn't what this was "-such good out of this, haven't we? It's messy and raw, but look at how much we've gotten out of it."

She nodded, a hiccup as she tried to choke back tears. 

"Talk, baby. Talk to me-"

"I don't want to be messy but I am. I think I just am and I wish I wasn't because you - because I wish I could be just me when I'm with you. I wish I'd known you before."

"What, when you were jail bait?"

She grunted, lashes parting as she looked at him.

He grinned back, really trying, but also - it wasn't trying anymore, was it? It was just how they worked, back and forth. It was second nature to tease her out of the dark places, second nature to laugh with her about it all. 

"I'd have wanted you anyway, even jail bait, and then Mark would've had something to be pissed about."

She did laugh then, and she rolled to her back at his side. Her fingers tripped down his arm and came to play with his hand, stroking and rubbing and soothing. She was soothing him.

"I wish there was a way I could do one thing - five things, however many things - as penance. And be done. And know it was done and feel it was done because after those things, that magic formula, it's all cleared out."

"Why can't you?" he said.

"Life doesn't work that way," she griped.

"Sure it does. Works that way if you want it to. I don't carry shit like you carry it, and I know that's personality and training, but if I don't carry it, why should you?"

"You'll have to teach me," she murmured.

"Okay, lesson number one. Five things to do for penance. You ready?"

She turned on her side, propped up to look at him. "You're serious."

"Yes."

"But I hurt you." Her eyes softened, those black holes made tender, and she touched her fingers to temple, skirted across his forehead and down his nose. It made his skin tighten. "I hurt you badly. No, don't say no. I didn't hurt us, but I hurt you, and that matters to me. It can't be erased with-"

"Yes, it can," he promised. "Five things. Penance. And the debt of woundedness is rubbed out. Built over. It doesn't mean that it didn't happen, and it doesn't mean that we aren't learning from it. But it means you've made it up to me. Okay?"

"You're doing this for me, not for you," she protested. 

"Trust me," he said, narrowing his eyes at her. "I can make it for me."

She frowned, her forehead creasing with furrows, and he rolled onto his side to smooth them out, reach for her. 

"You don't work this way, Kate, but I do. This has been how I've always handled things. You've seen me with Ben and Colin. A series of trade-offs. You and I even do that on some level too, you know."

"With sex," she muttered.

"And with the boys, dealing with their schedules. When I've been gone for a few days, I get home and you let me make it up to you by making breakfast and dinner, handling bath time, being the one they go to. You point them my direction, and I get to share in their lives that way, I get to make it up to you for being gone."

"Oh." She studied him, and he could see her thinking hard on it. "You make it up to me a lot. With - are you doing it because of your father? Making it up to me?"

"I was - some. In the beginning, those first few days. Making it up to you for - for the boys, for his treatment of you, for sticking my head in the sand and not listening when Colin tried to tell me. Buying shit and taking on the boys all by myself and - yeah. At first. But - hell, Kate, you think touching your breast in the hospital was me trying to make it up to you? If I'd wanted to make it up to you, I wouldn't have wanted you so badly."

Her lips twitched. She liked that, didn't she? Her hand lowered to his chest, the backs of her fingers rubbing lightly. "You asked permission, and you saw me as a - a woman, a person - and that was entirely arousing. And then your mouth on me, nursing... oh, that was - the most intimate and beautiful thing I've ever done."

He snaked his arm around her waist and tugged her into him, pressing them chest to chest. "I was sorry to see those beautiful breasts go."

She laughed, tugging his earlobe for that remark.

"They're still beautiful," he whispered. "Just not nearly as tasty."

She laughed again, a little more helpless sounding, a little more wonderful. 

He was making her laugh. "You ready to make it up to me?" he murmured. 

She nodded against his neck, let out a shaky breath. "I want to - it's not just penance, Rick. I need - punishment. I need to be - nothing."

"I can't do that," he whispered. "I can't be part of something that makes you nothing. I won't. I can go pretty far in the punishment direction, I promise you that, but it will always be to make you more, give you more of yourself back, more of me. It will be freedom, not annihilation."

She buried her mouth into his shoulder, and he knew that wasn't always what she wanted. Sometimes she did want to be annihilated, and he knew that, but she was too vital and intense and necessary for that. 

"Okay," she said finally. "Five things for penance. And at least two of them are punishment."

He grumbled but at least she was talking.

Ha. Talking was punishment. "Alright, agreed."

She pulled back, eyes on his, and he realized she was ready right now to start.

"Let me think on it," he said. "Give it the weight it deserves."

She gave him a sober look. "Yes. Please."

"You do realize your punishment will be sex-related, don't you?"

Her cheeks flushed red - not embarrassed, not ashamed - just pure, hot lust as it burned through her blood. "I... yes. I hope so. I - need that."

"I do too," he growled.

\-----

“It’s time to go,” he told her. His voice was stern, that tone he’d adopted years ago when she’d been unable to get her shit together and she’d needed someone to just say stop it. Or fuck me, as the case might be. 

Just do it. Whatever the fearful thing, whatever the hard thing, whatever the issue she was confronting, just plow right through it. He hardened himself and thus steeled her.

It had always worked.

It wasn’t working at this moment. 

But she nodded and pulled on the pair of jeans he’d called down to the concierge to acquire. They didn’t fit exactly right, and she realized she had probably lost weight while-

“You lose weight?” He hooked his finger in the waistband of her jeans and dropped down to his knees before her. Took up the ballet flats and slid them on her feet. “While I was gone?”

“Guess so,” she said, heart sinking. She hadn’t thought it had been about him. But maybe it had.

“I was gone too long,” he said quietly. “And you were trapped in the city where it happened to you. Where your parents died. We share-”

“There’s no sharing here,” she interrupted, setting her jaw even as she watched him set her feet back on the floor. “We don’t share responsibility for me. I am responsible for me. My actions.”

Her actions. She had done this. To him. She had done this to him, the one man who had only and ever wanted the world for her.

God.

She didn’t want the fucking world, she didn’t, she couldn’t handle the fucking world. Look at what she’d done with it. Look at how fucked up she was. How she-

“Did I, or did I not, tell you to stop thinking about yourself that way?”

She ducked her head and grabbed for her t-shirt, wormed into it as she avoided his scalding gaze.

But when her head came through the shirt, he grabbed her by the chin. “Beckett. Don’t you dare spiral. We’ve had enough of that. Fucking hell. Every time you start spiraling, it makes me feel like shit. We’re connected like that, you know we are, and you know I feel the shit you-”

“I know,” she cried out, jerking her head back. “I know.” Her voice was unsteady and she hated that too. “But you know that spiraling is what I do when I have no - when there’s no - I have no focus, no purpose. I need-”

“Penance,” he supplied. His eyes searched hers, his hands on her knees as if to hold her there. “You need penance.”

“I need...” She bit her bottom lip, struggling against the urge to cry. She felt cracked in half. “I need to be worth it.” She shook her head before he could speak again, gripped his hand where he had tightened at her knee. “For myself as well as you. I need to work for your - for my own - redemption. Otherwise it’s meaningless, it’s ash.” She swallowed hard and folded her hands in her lap, trying not to shake. “Penance means working my way to - to something more than this.”

Rick released her knees, his eyes on hers. “Then penance you shall have,” he murmured. He got to his feet once more, never taking his eyes off her. He offered her his hand and she took it, let him draw her upright as well.

But she didn’t have the steel. She didn’t have the hardness yet to face the world. Her shields had cracked, deep this time, and she hadn’t found a way to repair those fault lines in her psyche.

But penance. Penance she could do. Penance was a mission, and she knew how to complete a mission.

She took a deeper breath and crossed her arms over her chest, allowing herself to fall back on defensive body language in order to at least psychologically convince herself she was secure. Safe.

She felt anything but.

“Five things, remember?” He caught her by the hip and twisted a fist in the hem of her burnout navy t-shirt. “Here’s number one, Kate. We’re going to get back the car, and your phone, and-”

He leaned in and pulled her impossibly closer, their hips jostling, his knuckles hard against her pelvis.

His breath tickled her temple an instant before he pressed his teeth to her eyebrow and bit the scar there. 

She shuddered, gripped his arms to keep from sinking to the floor.

“And we’re getting back your damn panties, Kate Beckett. No one but me has the right. No one.”

\-----

Kate sank into the passenger side of the red sports car and pulled her legs inside even as Castle was slamming shut the door. She huffed and angled her knees towards the center console, rubbing the spot where the door had caught her.

When he got behind the wheel, his jaw was set in a way that meant business. She chose not to mention the brusque clipping of her knee, and instead pulled on her seatbelt, studying his profile.

“I’m pissed,” he said evenly, and started the car.

The Dodge Viper purred as it came to life. Thrummed under her seat and between her legs. She shivered and pressed her bruised knees together, squirming as the vibrations reached her clit. 

Shit.

He was pissed and she was horny. Not a good combination when those two slid so easily back and forth, up against each other, one to the other.

“I’m heart-broken, but the anger has won out, and I’m telling you this because it’s fucking pointless and stupid to do something I’ll regret, but I don’t know that I’ll stop before that point. Should it come to it.”

She let out a fast breath and glanced at his face.

Oh.

Oh, he was livid. Fury incarnate. He wasn’t being wry; he was deadly serious.

Sometimes she forgot that he had been trained an assassin, that his code of morality was based on a primitive violence that held no room for emotional repercussions or even earthly consequences.

He didn’t do regret. And yet, he was more man than machine these days, and he would regret the violence if only because of her.

Two years of therapy had straightened that first part out for her, and then two more years before they’d gotten to this moment in the car.

She would have to be his leash, because he was incapable of it where her person was concerned.

“I won’t let you,” she said finally.

He turned onto Eighth Avenue and the car gave a shudder through its transmission as the gears shifted. That muscle flexed at his jaw, his eyes set in that hard and particular slant where it looked like he could penetrate to the marrow with that gaze.

“I won’t let you,” she said again, firmer this time. “Every life matters.”

“Every-” He sucked in a breath that whistled through his gritted teeth, but he didn’t finish it.

“Everyone deserves second and third and a hundred chances, Castle, or else no one does, I don’t-”

“Stop,” he husked.

She ceased, but only long enough to find a new tack. “Doing violence brings you down to his level-”

The car jerked. “Did he do violence to you?” he snapped.

“No,” she hissed. “But you doing violence to him says he fucking mattered. He didn’t matter. He’s nothing. He could be anything, anyone. He could have been she, what the fuck, I wasn’t picking someone to pick someone. I was blowing up my life.”

“I know,” he rasped. His voice was tight and she leaned in, knees pressing to the console as she leveraged herself closer. She wrapped her fingers around his bicep and sank her cheek to his shoulder. He was breathing slowly like he had to keep thinking about it, practicing.

“I don’t even know the name. Some woman in that bar treated me like shit, like how I felt I deserved, it would have been her. And would you be doing this?”

“No.”

She growled, and he reached back suddenly and gripped her by the knot of her hair. Roughly. 

“Rick-”

“A woman would have been better,” he said. “Not for me. But for you. No woman could have made you feel like - no woman would have done what you wanted done to your soul. To that part of you that you keep trying to crush and maim and kill when you’re like that.”

Break herself, yes, but she was already broken. Crush and maim and kill was right. She had wanted - she had wanted to snuff out her own existence in the most brutal and vicious way-

him.

Castle. Only he had power over her like that.

Black’s voice never ceased in her head, and she knew the damn lies even if she couldn’t always suppress them. But it wasn’t Black that could kill her. Black had never managed it, and never would.

But Castle could kill her with a look. 

“I don’t want some fucking asshole having anything of yours left to him. He wouldn’t care for - no, no.” Castle growled and smashed the heel of his hand into the steering wheel, causing the car to shiver in its lane. “No. He gets nothing. He is nothing, and he gets nothing, and I’m damn well not leaving your fucking keys to that car at his fucking place when the onboard nav-”

“I know,” she said quickly. He wanted to make it about logistics, and she knew he did, so badly he wanted this to be rational.

But it wasn’t.

He had been reduced to his base elements. She had reduced him. And it was her fault, whatever happened as a consequence.

“If it had been a woman,” she sighed. Wishing.

“Any one,” he said roughly. His hand tightened in her hair and kept her head against his shoulder, hard, making her hurt. “Any one other than me, Kate, and I’ll feel gutted like this. You’re mine. Mine. No one else touches you.”

She couldn’t even begin to hate herself for craving that possession. She had moved so far past those preconceptions of feminine power and strength that his claim on her only filled her.

Made her strong. Made her powerful.

Made her more than this.

Because he was hers. Son of Black, her tormentor’s prized heir - she had him.

She had him.

It hadn’t been only about smashing herself into pieces that couldn’t be repaired. Or even about making herself as damaged in his eyes as she felt inside.

It’d been about having him. Too much; she had too much. She had everything in him and she hadn’t paid for it. She hadn’t worked for it. She had done nothing.

And yet.

\-----

Of course he knew exactly where he'd picked her up from, a shit-hole with an unserviced elevator on the nastier side of Greenwich Village. GV which had a higher rate of violent crime and domestic disturbance than even Washington Heights, and that too boiled in his blood and ate at his guts like acid.

She kept her hand wrapped around his bicep, the vulnerable inside skin, her ragged nails scratching at his armpit so that it was a constant reminder of her. Nothing in words, nothing spoken, just sensation that caused a feedback loop through his body and settled him.

If he could be settled.

He wasn't settled. No. But he was something altered when she touched him.

Like every clean up mission they had, when they ran up against someone who had seen her in Black's facility, someone who had been there, she was the only one who could stay his hand, who could cool his blood at all.

Sometimes she let him. Depending on the person and the range of her darkness that day, sometimes she let him.

Sometimes he lived for that moment. freedom.

He parked a block away, a neat job of it, parallel to the curb exactly, and that pleased him. She was entirely quiet, which didn't please him, but he didn't know how to make her be involved, be present. She did this, shut down, went away, and he still had no surefire method of bringing her back.

Except for his fingers between her legs.

"You're coming with me," he said, and checked his mirror before opening his door.

She stayed where she was, and he moved swiftly around the car to open her side, extending his hand because she was worth it and in every gesture and comment he wanted her to know she was.

She kept her hand in his - or rather, she allowed him to keep her hand - and he strode down the sidewalk for the shitty apartment building. When they passed the alley, she shivered and crowded into his side only to immediately step away.

He tightened his grip on her and she seemed to keep pace with him, approaching the wooden security door without alacrity but enough awareness to soothe him. The door was reinforced with metal plates at the locks and handle, but Castle studied the worn deadbolt a moment, and then withdrew his black ops service weapon.

“Rick-” 

He smashed the butt of his gun into the seam where the door met the frame and the old wood gave way immediately. Rotted through, and all he had to do was knock off some paint and manually gouge out clearance for the deadbolt to move free of the frame.

“There are a whole building’s worth of people who don’t deserve this,” she said tightly.

He composed his face at that and managed to show nothing of his utter fucking apathy. “There are,” he agreed. “And the property manager should be fucking shot. The whole fucking frame is rotted through.” And to prove it, he gave a hard shove on the door and it swung inward, groaning as the wood disintegrated.

She scowled.

He didn’t have the capacity to care about the building’s other occupants right now. He focused on getting them in off the street in the middle of broad daylight, pushing the door back into its frame before hustling her towards the stairs.

Unserviced elevator was not okay.

She dragged along behind him, but she wasn’t struggling physically. He ignored the soft pat of her ballet flats on the treads and he climbed the stairs, one after another, letting the monotony of the task numb his brain.

At the top floor, he checked the hall first, weapon still at the ready, and then he took her hand once more and stalked down the corridor. Doors spaced unevenly on each side, only odd numbers, indicated cramped apartments inside.

“Real winner,” he muttered. Winced.

She didn’t hear him. He glanced at her from the side of his face as he headed down the hall.

“I don’t know... which apartment,” she murmured.

“Yes, you do.” He knew which apartment. He’d called the bar and hunted the fucker down in DMV records, but she was Beckett, she knew the apartment even blind drunk and blackly bleak.

She paused in the middle of the hall and he came up short, waiting two paces away from her, saying nothing. She chewed on her bottom lip and started moving again, past him, heading for number 19D.

She lifted her hand to knock.

He caught her by the wrist, squeezed a little too tightly only to bring her knuckles against his lips for a grazing kiss. She blinked, stared at him, and he turned his back to her, aimed his weapon high at the door frame.

“Rick-”

He shot. “Too late.” Screams from next door, deadly quiet immediately following. 

“Castle,” she croaked.

He shoved a shoulder into the seam of door and frame, and once more, with the help of his bullet’s destruction, he ripped the door right through the rotted wood.

“Castle,” she whispered. “God.”

“Not today,” he said tightly, shoving forward into the apartment.

A man was staggering up from a back bedroom, no shirt, stained jeans with distressed holes in the knees. Tatts across his chest, muscles broad and thick from lifting deadweights or unloading delivery trucks, but a beer gut at the waistband of his sagging jeans.

“Fuck are you?” he slurred, shook his head like a dog.

Castle brought up the weapon, trained it easily on the man. Not that he expected to need it. He turned to Kate. “Keys. Phone. Panties. Or else. Now go.”

Her face was white as chalk and her mouth dropped open.

“Who the fuck you think you are? Fuck you, man, you fucking shot my door up-”

Castle gave the man a cold and final look.

The man shut up, stepping backwards and slamming into the angle of the hall and living room/kitchen.

Kate slipped past Castle like a ghost, hesitated near the couch.

The man lit up. “You.” And then his face grew bullish, those jowls scowling. “You. You fucking me up, you fucking whore-”

Castle put a round in the wood near the man’s head, and both Kate and the asshole jumped and looked at him.

He looked at Kate. Raised an eyebrow in question.

She shivered and shook her head, avoided his eyes as she scurried to the couch.

The asshole made a drunk-stagger step forward and Castle moved only far enough to remind the man he was there. Asshole lurched back, hesitating. “You can’t fucking do this. Shake me down. She fucking came on to me.”

Castle ignored him and focused on Kate. “Cushions. Pick them up, look under.”

She shot him a baleful look over her shoulder. “I’m looking.”

He aimed the gun at the asshole’s head.

Her eyes glittered dangerously and she straightened up, hands on her hips.

Castle grit his teeth, fury and pride beating the shit out of each other in his chest. “Get a move on, Becks. Check his room. He probably took them with-”

“You can’t go in my room. This is my fucking apartment. What the fuck-”

Castle pulled the trigger and a window exploded near the asshole’s head.

He screamed like a fucking stuck pig even though it was only a little blood. 

“What the hell?” she hissed at him. “This is not being subtle.”

“Fuck subtle,” he snapped back, glaring at her.

She glared back. “Get control of yourself.”

“I have control.” He let her see the cold rage in his eyes, enough that she wilted a little and took a hesitating step towards the hall. He gestured with his chin past the bleeding pig asshole. “Go quickly. Before I do not have control.”

\----


	9. Chapter 9

Her hands were shaking as she stripped the bed. Shaking, and her stomach was rising in her throat, acid reflux that burned clear to her sinuses.

She had to stop and swallow it down, press the heels of her hands into her eye socks to block out the smell.

The smell of sweat and alcohol. The smell of shame.

She gagged and made it to a trash can, spit the remnants into its depths. 

Oh.

Not a trash can. Some kind of metal art piece? This guy hardly had art, maybe it was a spittoon. That would be fine.

She pressed a hand to her forehead and took a slow breath, sweat damp on her skin. Clammy. She swallowed again, but the taste lingered on her tongue, that burn of stomach acid.

Or else.

She hurried back for the bed and pushed a foot into the mattress, shoving it away from the box spring. 

Oh, shit, thank God. There they were. Kate dove forward and snatched up her underwear, stuffed them into the back pocket of her jeans. She still hadn’t found her keys or phone, but she thought maybe those mattered a fuck of a lot less than the black cotton panties.

She could smell them. Fucking hell, that was why?

Kate shivered. No wonder Castle-

She couldn’t. Not here, the bed and the sheets and the smell. She couldn’t bring him past the door, or just inside it, where he had his weapon trained on the guy like a casual encounter.

None of this was casual.

She had to find her fucking phone. The keys. He’d driven the Dodge Viper, but it wasn’t theirs. She’d taken their car and run, and even though she’d done it before, she’d never wrecked that car, that specific car where she put the boys in the backseat and buckled them in, that car with the apple juice stain on the ceiling because Wyatt could do anything if it was destructive. The car Wolf would jump voluntarily into the backseat. 

She crossed her arms over her chest and surveyed the room. She wanted her fucking keys. The phone could rot. Burner, like usual for road trips, at least she had done that. (Because she had meant to burn every damn bridge, everything).

She was still shaking.

A gunshot came from the main room and she raced back through the doorway, found Castle glaring down at the guy, who was now sprawled unconscious on the floor.

“Did you shoot him?” she gasped.

Castle shot her a baleful look. “You stay on target. Phone. Keys. Pa-”

“Got the last,” she said quickly. “Tell me you didn’t-”

“It’s a graze. He fainted.” Castle came for her, already holstering the weapon. “It was taking too long. Don’t like you away from me.” He reached into her back pocket and plucked the panties out, crushed them in his fist with those hard and glittering eyes. “Think. Phone. Keys-”

“At the bar,” she gasped, blinking. Shook her head. “No. Phone was - here. I called you.”

“No.” He gripped her by the shoulder, digging harder than she’d expected, her knees dipping. “No, Becks. You borrowed a phone. Old guy. Remember? Phone and keys. You couldn’t find-”

“Bar, at the bar,” she supplied, pain clearing her head, clearing memories made hazy by shame and self-loathing. “I walked out without - wanted to walk out without them. Leave. All of it.” Her chest tightened. “Oh, God, I didn’t mean-”

“I know what you meant,” he growled. “Come on. We’re going.” He glanced once to the man sprawled akimbo on the living room floor. She could smell her own vomit in here. Castle’s jaw set and he looked away, moved for the door. “No more of this. No fucking more. We’re done here.”

She didn’t look, but she didn’t follow. “What did he say to you.”

Castle’s eyes were hot and furious when he came back to her, yanked her by the elbow and hauled her against his side, forcing her to march to the door. “What he said is of no damn importance.”

“You shot him. You told me you wouldn’t.”

“He moved at the last second,” Castle snapped, wrenching open the door. “You. You had one job; you accomplished only one-third of your mission. Now we’re going to that fucking bar, and we are reclaiming what is yours.”

What he really meant was mine. What was his.

“You can’t shoot people,” she said.

He pushed her towards the access door to the stairs, and even though he had drawn on some of that icy reserve once more, she saw the flames still licking high in his eyes. 

“Castle, you cannot shoot people in the middle of the fucking city.”

“What people. I shot a fucking dog.”

“You wouldn’t treat a dog that way.”

His jaw worked, but she saw a flicker of life in his eyes. Like a guttering flame. “No. You’re right. Wouldn’t do that to a dog.”

“He might need medical-”

Castle rounded on her, slammed her back against the wall of the stairwell, her head caught by the back of his hand half a second before it could crash against concrete. “He does not get a second more of your time. Our time. Done is done. He’s done.”

Was the guy bleeding to death back-

“Done is done, Kate Beckett. Do you fucking hear me? Or are you still stuck in your death spiral?”

She blinked and looked at him.

Of course he hadn’t killed the man. He wouldn’t have. Not just because it wasn’t a good idea in broad daylight when the neighbors most assuredly had already called the police the moment Castle had shot-

Oh, that was why he’d done it. To give himself a timetable. So he couldn’t-

“Beckett.”

“Here,” she gasped. His fingers were tight around her nape, pinching too hard, but she stared up at him, nodded. “I’m here.”

“Is this done or are you-”

“Done,” she croaked. Wanted it to be true. “What did he say-”

Castle shook her. Her head rattled and she closed her eyes against it. He jerked her forward and she found herself tripping down the stairs after him, tugged by the leash of his hand around her neck. 

“Penance, then. The bar. And you will for fuck’s sake stop asking me about what that asshole said. Him and me, Beckett. You got no fucking part in it.”

But she did. And if this was penance, then it was a rougher punishment than she’d bargained on.

Not knowing.

Because for all Castle blustered, and ranted, and was so damn macho proud, she knew he had come very close to actually killing the man in cold blood.

Four rounds from his CIA service weapon said done wasn’t yet done.

\-----

Castle kept both hands on the wheel as he drove because he did not trust himself.

She was pressed into the center console, but she hadn’t come over it like she had on the way to the apartment. Now she didn’t seem able to make that move, claim him like that, after what had happened inside that building. 

He couldn’t find it in him to be sorry for it.

She wasn’t even worth it. Barely got in her.

Castle swallowed convulsively and twisted the rubber grip of the wheel between his hands. His chest was tight and the words wouldn’t get out of his head. The image.

She was pressed back in the corner of the passenger seat, as tightly compacted as she could get, but if he took his hands off the wheel, he might smash something with a fist.

He had almost smashed her into that damn wall. He hadn’t even known what he was doing, spinning around and confronting her, and it was only after he saw the flare of her eyes, both stunned and craven, that he realized he’d gripped her by the back of the skull and managed to smash his own hand instead.

Thank God for ingrained reflexes. For instinct which demanded he protect his partner in the field.

She popped her fingers back and dug her elbows into the seat. “There.” Her chin lifted, but she was staring at the dirty facade of the Low Places East Bar and Grill. Castle highly doubted it was anything like a grill, unless they meant the grills on the windows and the security chains looping the doors shut.

“Shit,” she whispered. “Not open?”

“It’s four in the afternoon. Someone will be in there,” Castle said, parking illegally with two wheels up on the sidewalk. He reached past Beckett’s pressed-together knees for the glove box, his underarm happening to graze those knees as he flicked it open.

Shit spilled out. Company car meant company covers, and he dug around until he found the DEA parking tag.

Her knee was pointy, digging into his armpit, and as he withdrew the parking tag, he lifted up only enough to wrap his arm around her upper thigh. She sucked in a breath, clutched at him, and he pressed his face into the seam of her legs, inhaling the rugged scent of new denim.

Her hands landed in his hair, tightened before releasing.

He took another breath for courage and pushed off the passenger seat to sit up again. She didn’t comment and he didn’t look at her, just hung the tag from the rear view mirror and proceeded to exit the car.

He walked around to the sidewalk and opened her door, reached in for her hand. She squeezed his fingers as she stood, unfolding herself from that compact and hard angle she had adopted inside the car.

“You do the talking,” he said. 

She chewed on her bottom lip, glanced in askance at the building.

“Your penance. Number two on the list,” he reminded her, but his voice wasn’t gentle. He was struggling to keep from shaking her, see what you tried to do to yourself, to my fucking partner, mine. But he didn’t even have a name for what they were, no idea what he called them, not when he’d told her no, I’m not marrying you like this.

He swallowed it down like bile and nudged her towards the front doors. On the way, they passed a heaping overflow of trash bags from the alley between the buildings, and Kate skittered to one side before darting forward.

And it came to him then that when she’d said the asshole had taken her in against the bricks in an alley, this was the fucking alley she was talking about.

This one that he was standing in front of him right the fuck now.

Fuck.

He took a long look, grimy facades and soot scarred fire escapes, a dumpster with too many black bags, top open and pouring putrescence into the air.

It wasn’t okay.

Fuck this, man. I don’t need this shit. She wasn’t even worth it. Barely got in her.

And on wasn’t worth it Castle had already fired a shot at the asshole’s head. Not at-at, merely a warning shot across the bow as they said, but the fucker had moved at the last second, turned his head and leaned forward as if to look down the hall towards Kate, and the bullet had creased his ear and gushed blood.

He’d slapped a hand to the wound, terror possessing him so immediately that he pissed his dark wash jeans with a darker wash and then rolled his eyes back in his head and dropped like a stone.

“What are we supposed - what I am supposed to do? It’s chained.”

“You knock, Becks.”

Her shoulders came up and he knew she was finding this harsh. He couldn’t stop; she wanted penance, she craved a way to make things right if this at all could be made right (it fucking couldn’t be made right; she had let someone else have her). But she needed it, and he was not such a monster that he wouldn’t provide her what she needed.

“Knock, Beckett. Right now.”

She lifted a shaky but impulsive fist and banged on the wooden door. The chains rattled in time, but a light came on, one of the neon Bud signs, and Castle saw a shadowed outline as it moved in the darkened bar.

“Knock again. A loud one to make him hustle a little. Like a fucking cop, Beckett.”

She gave him a fleeting look, but did as he instructed, pounding with both the side of her fist and the heel of her hand, making a dual noise that was stronger for the thumps.

“Respectable,” he gave grudgingly, even as a little window slid back and one-third of a face cocked an eye at them. Bleary and blood-shot, and it roved over Kate first, then came to him and stared.

“I was here last night,” she said quickly. “I think I left a few personal items at the bar. If you-”

“You’re the fucker who called.”

Castle crossed his arms over his chest so that his piece would show.

The guy inside cursed and stepped back, and Kate let out a little noise as the window-peek was slid shut.

“Wait for it,” Castle murmured, staying her with a hand at her elbow. “To the right.”

She gave him a bewildered look but glanced to their right where the stairs descending into a basement turned delivery bay in lieu of the huge sidewalk grates that usually opened up for the cases of beer as they arrived.

“Oh,” she murmured, as the door cracked and came open.

The guy inside gave a half-forward dart into the afternoon light only to rear back. “Come in. Ain’t got a lost-n-found, lady, but you can look.”

“Thanks,” she said, hurrying down the steps with Castle after her.

The inside in no way matched the outside. Leather stools with busted seams, the stuffing dangling out, lined the cheaply-made chrome bar. The walls were concrete blocks and peeling paint, with team pennants and band posters plastered here and there. The amber lights were on, and one neon, while the tables were in the darkness. No booths, sawdust on the floor that hadn’t been swept and refreshed, and the remnants of beer nuts scattered the bar top.

The bartender-owner gestured her with a hand, made the winding trek against one side of the cramped room towards the chrome bar.

“This is what you pick,” he snarled at her as she passed.

Her shoulders came up, but his anger was still white-hot, and he knew better. He knew what happened to her when she spiraled and took a runner; he knew there was no convincing her, no talking her down. No avoiding the inevitable.

Four years of therapy, and maybe it was time to call in an actual fucking licensed therapist. Because yeah they were working through their equal shit, but she had nearly wound up slitting her wrists.

He wasn’t blind. The fact that she had called him at all when she’d woken up less drunk than before was miraculous. Fucking hell, he believed if only because something something had saved her. She had been out of her mind when he had picked her up; she’d been a knife away from gouging straight up her arms and bleeding out.

But they didn’t have a therapist. And he didn’t know where to get one that would understand Kate as relentlessly as he did. Without reporting him as a fucking accessory to a heinous crime.

“My phone, my keys,” Kate gasped, lurching forward and holding them against her chest. She stared at him with the bar between them - the owner seemingly had swept everything up and dumped it in a box to pilfer later - and then she came around and hurried up to him.

At the last second, she swerved.

He didn’t know if it was the distress in his head leaking out onto his face, the fierceness of his rage at how she’d treated herself here, or if she just couldn’t do it. Touch him yet.

He grit his teeth and gave a tight nod to the owner, turned on his heel to follow Kate back through the delivery entrance and out into the afternoon. They climbed the steps and she aimed the key fob towards the street, pressing the lock button to see if they could hear the telltale beep of the horn as it set the car’s alarm.

He said nothing as he came after her. The brick alley was mocking him.

He couldn’t let that stand.

\-----

Kate gasped and lashed out when hands landed on her hips. But her feet were already off the sidewalk, Castle propelling her towards the alley.

“No.”

“Yes,” he snarled.

She put her hands up and caught herself against the brick, his body slamming into hers and crushing her to the wall. She groaned and he pressed harder, and she felt his face land hotly at the side of her neck, tears.

Fuck.

“Castle,” she cried out.

“Yes,” he growled, but his voice had a catch in it that shredded her.

His hands fumbled at her jeans and she pushed back against the angle of his body, realized only after she’d moved that she was only giving him access. His fingers popped open the button and yanked down her zipper, but instead of the quick, jerky, fumbling thrusts that were souring her stomach on replay in her head, she came up on her toes at the warm intrusion of his fingers.

He groaned and slumped against her. She shivered and caught the back of his head with a hand, pressed her cheek to his as he cupped between her legs.

“Please,” he husked.

“Yes,” she whispered, her tears coursing down her cheeks and tangling with his. He licked her neck and suckled, and his fingers curled in now, petting her. “Yes, for you-”

“Hush, love,” he said, though his voice still had the burr in it. “This is for you.”

For him, and they both knew better, but her legs were going weak at the sensations he dragged along her clit. She trembled and clutched at his head, the brick grinding into her already raw forearms, her hips shivering as she rocked.

His teeth sank into the tendons of her neck and she whimpered.

Rode his hand up, up-

“Not good enough,” he growled. His fingers jerked out from between her legs and she could’ve dropped through the earth. “Pants off, Kate. I’m hard as a rock.”

She blinked, dizzied by him, caught herself with both hands against the brick. He was - hard for her?

“Now, Beckett. Pants.”  
She heard him working at his own, the too-loud sound of the zipper behind her. She half-turned, but he slammed a thigh into hers and pinned her to the brick.

“How can I get my pants down if you won’t let me move?”

“You figure it out,” he snapped. He sounded breathless. He sounded aroused, and she didn’t know how that was possible.

But she would fucking well figure it out.

Beckett gripped the waist of her jeans and yanked at them, dragging the material over the bare skin of her thighs, heedless of the way the brick snagged and caught her. Panties were ill-fitting, chosen by the concierge earlier today, boy shorts that kept riding up.

Castle grabbed a fistful of the cotton-spandex material and pushed it aside, and suddenly she felt the intensity of his erection pressed between the cheeks of her ass.

She gasped, on her toes again, heart in her throat.

For a moment, everything was silent. Everything hinging on the next harsh rasp of his breath in his lungs and the feel of him at her back.

“No,” he whispered.

She closed her eyes, bowed her forehead to the brick, heart dropping.

“Turn around, love.”

She sobbed, but he wrapped an arm low around her waist, lifted her from her feet as he turned her like a doll. Awkward silence and the hindrance of her jeans, her back hitting the brick, his palm framing her jaw.

“Look at me.”

She opened her eyes.

“Say it again, Kate.”

She blinked and the tears fell free, streaked down her face. His eyes were so blue, the wide open sky, even as his body was heavy against hers, pressing her to the brick.

“I’m in love with you,” she whispered.

He kissed her. His tongue, searching and strong, and she was swept up in it, swept away. Breath, sight, memory, all his, all flowing one to the other, consumed not subsumed, communion not subjection.

She wound her arm around his neck and pressed herself up into him. All of her. Something like joy, something very like it, as close as she ever thought possible for her, and his hand traveling under her shirt and caressing her skin.

She shifted as wide as her jeans would allow, bound at the knees, and she reached into the nest of his groin to find him. His own hand found her, at exactly the same time, and she took a gulping breath, eyes opening to his as he touched her and she touched him.

“I’m in love with you, Kate,” he said into her open mouth. “What you do to this woman I love, what you do to her.”

She was crying again, and he was licking tears from the curves of her lips, her nose, even as his fingers stroked inside her. She had expected something else entirely, and had been confronted instead with his adoration, and that hurt more than what she’d thought he would want, the rough and dirty fuck against a wall.

“This is my body you throw away,” he whispered. “My body you abuse and disdain. Mine.”

She kissed him to make him stop, but he poured out his grief even without words, poured it into her, all the ways she had betrayed him.

Kate tried to lift her hips into him, tried to hurry him up with her hand around his cock, but he wouldn’t. She stroked and played, and while he was heavy and thudding with blood, he wasn’t fierce with it, wasn’t that angry erection he’d had earlier today. 

Even his cock was grief-stricken. Unwilling but wanting. She didn’t know how to seduce him; she had never needed to before.

He broke from her mouth and stared down at her for a heartbeat. She went still, fingers curled around him, and he separated their lower bodies with a nudge. His hand took hers, tugged her away (she could feel her own wetness at her wristbone where he touched her), but in the next moment, he was lacing her underwear down to her knees.

She watched him go down, jerked when his lips darted in to kiss her inside thigh, followed his progress back up to standing.

Looming over her, and yet somehow also still so curved inward, like she was his orientation.

He pressed his thumb into her thigh and it hurt, a bruise somewhere there, and it must have shown on her face because he did it a little harder and shuffled into her.

She grunted when their groins collided, bucked her hips when his cock speared her folds. He knocked her hand away once more, gripped her hips with those strong and bruising fingers, and hefted her up the wall.

She cried out, skin and ass scraping against the brick, but her yelp was transfigured into a cry of pleasure, relief, as his cock invaded.

She trembled, clutching his shoulder and back, her legs useless and dangling, tangled by her jeans.

Castle slammed his hips into her and his cock followed, forcing himself deeper. She sank her head to his shoulder and mouthed his name please as she sank her teeth into his skin.

He grunted and began to pump his hips, slowly, making it interminable. She couldn’t move to help, couldn’t even touch the ground, and with her legs dangling down, she was almost too tight for him.

And yet he fucked her anyway, pushing himself higher inside. She bit her tongue and gnawed on her bottom lip to keep from screaming, the intensity of this coupling so fierce she was out of her mind.

Castle fucked her against the wall, exactly as he wanted, putting her where he wanted her, and she only wound tighter and harder and more on edge.

Suddenly he grunted, slammed once into her and held still, and she felt his cock pulsing in her narrow channel. Castle growled and ground into her, sparks against her clit, his fingers digging into her hips.

“Fuck,” he snarled, and then climaxed brilliantly inside her. His hips rocked as he orgasmed, their whole bodies pressed together, and the rasp of his cheek against hers was peeling her raw.

She was filled with him, and still his cock was hard, not softening at all, and now as he rocked against her, it grew purposeful, intent, sharp as a sword.

She mewled, her head going back to the brick, and now it was impossible, inescapable, this tension of need clawing her insides. She could do nothing at all to help, pinned on his hook, and he now he made love to her, a hand gripping her breast under the shirt, his mouth dusting her neck, her eye, her temple.

She cried out for him, tears drying on her chin, body moving in a wave to meet him.

When her orgasm finally collapsed over her, it was like falling, crashing back to the earth after flying too close to the sun. Whiting out, burning hot, too filled with dreams of joy to even noticed the ground rushing to meet her.

\-----


	10. Chapter 10

“Hey,” he murmured at her ear, combing her hair back from her face. Broad daylight and an overflowing dumpster, and how was she the most heartbreakingly beautiful thing he had ever held in his hands? “Sweetheart.”

She slid her arms around his neck as he lowered her feet to the ground. He didn’t let go, not being sure she had her balance, her wits again, and she leaned into him, proving him right.

“Kate.”

She shook her head against him and he ceased, fell into silence. But they had to talk. God. There was too much here. Something had to be said. This wasn’t something that could be ignored or put in the corner; this was bad. Her vision of her own self-worth was being reflected back at him in every place they visited from her runner last night.

And it was bad.

He cupped the back of her neck with one hand, used the other to brush brick dust from her shirt, the abraded skin. He sighed when she shivered, reached down to find the cotton of her clothing. Kate struggled then, did it herself, shimmying in that natural and unconscious movement that always made his heart falter for loving her so much.

He was still just standing there watching her break his heart when she buttoned her jeans and reached for him. He caught the backs of her arms and held her as she used the hem of her t-shirt to wipe his cock, tucked him inside his boxers with practiced yet reverent touch.

He let loose a stuttering sigh, like coming down off a crying jag, and she leaned in and kissed the hollow of his throat as she zipped him up.

“Thank you,” he murmured. At her little cry, he squeezed her arms. “For being yours.”

She laid her cheek to the top of his shoulder, a hand protective at his groin as if to shield him. “Thanks for wanting to be mine.” 

He couldn’t not say anything. But this wasn’t the place to say it. “You have the keys?”

“Dropped them,” she admitted, shifting back.

He stayed her with a hand and knelt himself, spotted them beside the dumpster before she could move. He scooped up the keys - and her phone, which had also fallen, the screen had shattered. It was a burner, so it barely mattered, but he pocketed it before she could see it, afraid of what she might portend in it.

When he stood, her fingers trailed across his back and fell away. He caught her hand and checked her - clothes were adjusted, hair in wild disarray, flushed but not lewd, which mattered somehow after what he’d asked of her. He led her down the alley and back towards the street, pressing the key fob himself.

She spotted the car first, three blocks down, and he grimaced at the parking job she’d done, and what it told about her state. She was a more precise driver than himself, and this showed a degree of both carelessness and also inability to attend that made him even more resolute in his conviction to talk to her.

It was the old Subaru Crosstrek, chosen for its four-wheel drive and space in the back for the boys and the wolf. It was deep navy in color, always blended well in the trees and shadows, never drew attention, not even here in the city with its mudded flaps and rust-tinted door seams.

Castle opened her passenger door and now she gave him a look. He handed her inside and leaned in past her for the center console, popped it up to fish out the surplus phones. Down to three now, and he dropped one in her lap, skimmed her knee as he left it there.

She drew her fingers through his hair and gripped the back, tugged until he looked up at her. She shook her head. “You don’t have to-”

“I do,” he said quietly, willing her to believe. “I do, because you don’t seem to.”

She closed her mouth, averted her eyes. He reached for her seatbelt and drew it across her body, and she didn’t protest that either, and he knew it was because she was still in a headspace that wasn’t so hot right now.

He clicked the seatbelt secure in its lock and stepped back, shut the passenger door. As he came around the back, he pulled the old burner out of his pocket, yanked the sim card, dropped the hunk of metal on the pavement. He stomped hard with his boot to make it worthless, and then he pocketed the sim.

Behind the wheel of their familiar vehicle felt good. Right again. He fished out his own phone and called the Office machine, left a message for a pick-up of the company Viper he’d left back at the bar. 

“I should drive and let you-”  
“No,” he said. “There is no should, Kate.”

She huffed. Therapy language was her least favorite, but he’d employ whatever means were necessary to make her understand.

“Fine, no should. But I could drive this one and let you drive the Viper back to the garage. I’ll be right behind you.”

“No,” he answered simply, and said nothing more.

She sighed but he knew she was in no condition to fucking drive. Least of all behind him. Maybe he’d drive behind her, follow her back to the Office’s garage, but no, fucking hell no.

“We need to talk,” he said, turning the Subaru towards the tunnel. “Therapy talk.”

She was silent, a waiting silence he felt, and he glanced once to her be sure. Her face was turned towards the window. She had nothing but the clothes he’d ordered down for her, and they weren’t anything great. Bare essentials. A phone he kept for emergency-spy-paranoia. 

Not acceptable. He would fix that.

“Fine,” she gritted out. “Fine. Start talking, Castle, and I’ll come in when I can.”

His lips twitched at that. At least she sounded like herself, if not happy with his insistence on a therapy session right now.

“It wasn’t just about burning your bridges last night. You wanted to kill yourself, Kate.”

She let out a wounded noise, crumpled against the door, hiding her face in her hands.

He reached over the console and took one of her hands, wrestling her for it, dragged it over into his lap, just that one connection. Just enough. His palm was clammy with sweat.

“Do I need to enumerate every piece of evidence? Or can we just agree that today’s tour through yesterday’s runner is pretty damning.”

She was crying again.

“Baby, if you can’t care about yourself when you’re like that, it will - would kill me if I found you - like that after-” He gripped the wheel with one hand and lifted their clasped hands to his face, swiped at his own tears. “Don’t do that to me. Don’t leave me.”

She wept.

He was crying too. He was going to have to pull over before they even made it to the tunnel.

\-----

“Come here. Comere-”

Kate fumbled at her seatbelt where his hand was already tugging fruitlessly at the buckle. She depressed it and it clicked and the belt snaked back around her lap and she moved for him even as he grabbed for her.

He dragged her over the center console, her knee smashed spectacularly into the steering wheel, he whispered apologies into her hair. He clung to her, and she buried her face in his neck and felt his tears smeared behind her ear.

He had pulled over. A parking spot that wasn’t a parking spot, and traffic crept outside his window while they both clutched at each other, tried to control it, whatever this was that had started in her, moved to him, and now was thrumming in her again.

Grief. Just grief.

“I got you,” he was saying at her ear. His voice rusty. “I got you now. I got you.” He’d started out like he was reassuring her, but now he sounded like he was reassuring himself.

She tried to lift from his neck to speak. “I don’t want-” She couldn’t. His arms banded around her shoulders and tugged her down to him, and she fell back to his neck and gave him a moment more, just the two of them gulping down breath and tears.

When his chest expanded hard with a stuttering sigh, and then his arms eased from her, she finally pushed back. Lifted up. His hair was mussed from her hands, his eyes shiny blue with tears, and his lips twisted with wry acknowledgement of their state.

She had done this to him.

He reached up and fingered a loose strand of her hair, tucked it behind her ear. “I don’t want to find your body one day.”

Her shoulders hunched up, but she planted her palms flat to his chest, felt his heart thumping madly beneath the material of his shirt. Pumping. 

“Do you understand what that would do to me?” He trailed his fingertips over her collarbone, and then his arm fell heavily between them, warm almost between her legs. “If you don’t care about you, do you at all care about me?”  
“Of course I do,” she whispered.

“Then don’t do that to me. Don’t make me live without you.”

“I-”

“I had a dream, a nightmare, when we were here last. With the boys, when we got the MRIs? I dreamed you had gouged the arteries right up your arms, found you in the bathtub, too late.”

“Oh, God.”

His fingers flexed at her inside thigh, very high, widened to grip her hip. “And then you told me how you thought you’d die. That the MRI would show - that it would just be the end.”

Of course she remembered that, their last day. She still called it that in her head, spending that time at the zoo with the boys and Castle, taking them to the playground, how peaceful that day had been, filled with such light, because she’d known - thought she had known - that this was the end of things for her.

“Back then, I barely had you.” He snagged her hand and pressed his lips to her knuckles. “I knew you as my heart. You are my heart, but even then, back then, I knew you were the good in me.”

“Rick,” she protested.

“Hush, baby, and listen to me. Because I need to tell you this story from my point of view. You’re the good in me, you’re the one who teaches me right from wrong, light from dark. Back then, I could feel the beginnings of that, and it scared me, made me sick to think I’d miss out on that, that I’d had you for a handful of days, and then you’d be gone.”

“I didn’t mean-”

“I know you didn’t mean to. But this time you did. This time, God. This time, we’re family, Kate. You and me and the Wolf and the twins. We’re all connected so irrevocably, not just in damn daily routines, but in here.”

He pressed her hand against his chest, thumped hard. His eyes were fierce.

“You can’t tell me I don’t fill you up like you fill me up,” he harshed. “Your head inside my head. Your heart enmeshed in mine until they beat together.”

Tears streaked her cheeks again.

“I know you do, because even in this we’re trading this grief back and forth. But what happens if you take yourself out? You’d rip out my heart, Beckett. You’d be a dark vacuum in my head where you ought to be. My life would be...”

She dashed the back of her hand against her cheek, bowed until her forehead hit his chin.

He cupped the back of her neck and his lips brushed her head. “Thinking about it fills me terror. How do I face those boys without you? How do I... you’ve made me more - so damn much more than - I was never anything at all until I found you, and if you’re gone-”

“I hear you, I hear you,” she said desperately. Trying anything to make him stop pouring all this grief into her. Therapy language but it seemed to work. He took a shuddering breath, caught his breath.

“I don’t... know how to do this if you’re not - if you’re dead.” His voice was flat as he spoke, but he shook his head and his eyes met hers with such bleak despair. “This is the story, this is how it would go, Kate. I’d bury you, and my knees would sink into the dirt over your body and I wouldn’t be able to get up again. I’d see those boys and I’d see you, and how I’d lost you, and I wouldn’t be able to face them, touch them, without ruining them with all the terrible nothing you’d leave in me.”

She gripped his shirt, the heel of her hand pressing into his thudding heart. “You wouldn’t let the boys-”

“I’d be broken.” He gripped the back of her neck hard. “It would break me to find your body.”

“I wouldn’t let it be you to find me.”

He gasped, pain etching deep in the lines of his face. She slapped a hand over her mouth and stared at him as he stared at her, and the tears sprang up again, tracked over her hand.

“I’m sorry,” she groaned. “I’m sorry. That’s not-”

“Don’t you dare do that to me either.” He shook her, stopped immediately to haul her back down against his chest. His desperation surged up between them again, flooding her, drowning them. “Don’t - oh, God, you can’t - can’t leave me. Don’t leave me.”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she moaned, struggling against the tide of his emotion as it poured through her. It was exhausting, suffocating, and her tears washed down her cheeks and soaked his shirt where she’d buried her face.

“Don’t, just don’t - don’t even say you’d leave me searching, searching for your - you know I’d feel you gone, Kate. I would know it, I’d have less of me, less, and to know you were dead and still not be able to bring you home and do anything at all to-”

“I’m sorry, so sorry, stop.” She struggled in his arms, the images he projected slamming into her, one after another, deep and formless and sour with his grief. “You have to stop. You’re crushing me with it. Stop.”

He choked on his next words, maybe a sob, and now his arms did the crushing, pressing every part of her to him as much as he could.

She remembered then what Colin had once told her, how he got it back. The ocean, the feeling of floating, bobbing to the surface.

She didn’t have an ocean, but she had a host of memories of the lake. With the boys and their father, Castle being tender and teaching at the same time, guiding James’s explorations through the lake forest, carrying Wyatt on his shoulders deeper and deeper.

Coming for her, far from shore, with that smile and the grinning kiss and teasing his fingers along the strap of her bikini. 

In the cramped driver’s seat of their car, Castle gave a shuddering inhalation, nuzzled his nose down the top of her shirt. Breathed in again.

Some of the panic-inducing grief began dropping from him, falling off his shoulders, sliding off his skin like water. He lifted his head and even though his eyes were shadows, he could look at her again without dragging her down.

She cupped his cheeks, apologies on her lips that wouldn’t come. She searched those eyes, waiting for the moment when he pulled back from that future he was unspinning for himself.

“I won’t,” she said. Firm voice, though she had no clue how to keep this promise. “I won’t do that to you. Or them. Myself, I - that could be what I was thinking, subconsciously maybe, what all that self-sabotage means... but I need help, Castle. I need something to - I don’t know. I don’t know what I need to stop me, but there has to be something I haven’t thought of-”

“We’ll get it,” he said quickly. “We’ll put things in place. Therapy, more work - missions. You’ve done so good, baby, so fucking good on those clean-up runs, and I know you’d be amazing as an agent. We’ll find a way to live with-”

“I want to thrive,” she promised. “Not just live with this. I want to be - more than this.”

“I just want you,” he husked. “Just don’t take you away from me.”

“Then help me.” She felt desperate suddenly, all over again, teetering on the edge. “Oh, God, you have to help me. I can’t-”

“I got you,” he said. His voice filled the car, filled her head. “I have you. We’re going to make it. We’re going to figure this out, no matter what it takes. You’ll be here.”

She slumped down into him, dizzy with relief. “I’ll be here,” she echoed, wanting to believe it.

His hand came to her head, combed her hair back. “You will. Besides, I know you’re hot for me on missions. Think of all the fun we’ll have escaping the arms dealers in Italy, racing through the narrow little streets on a Vespa, my arms around you as you drive us up the winding alley to our safe house, my fingers down your pants.”

She laughed, suddenly sparked through with that image of them, and how vividly he could imagine that as well, how that feeling diffused through her like ink in water, staining her crimson and flushed.

\-----

“I want you to touch me on Vespas and sneak sex inside the cathedrals and-”

He laughed. “Who said anything about sneaking sex inside a cathedral?” His eyebrows rose dramatically, his hands framing her ribs because he could feel her blood thrumming through her body like this, the beat of her heart and the expanse of her lungs. “Baby, you’re devious.”

She smiled back, lips pressed together in that Mona Lisa smile. Entirely gorgeous.

“Devastating.”

An eyebrow raised, question.

“You.” He cupped her face and kissed her, soft lips and breath, visions for that future passing between them like memory. Images coalescing into need as her tongue grew clever; her fingers slipping under his shirt and along his stomach.

He groaned into her mouth, the touch of her like fire, burning clear the immediate crush of grief. She licked his bottom lip, swirled back against his tongue, that thing she did as she ground her hips into him, and fuck if that didn’t always set him off.

“Not here,” he husked. “Not in full view of these assholes on the street with your ass in the air.”

“So I’ll turn around,” she whispered. “Grind my ass back on you.”

He grunted in surprise, a little turned on (a lot), but he shook his head and stilled her hips. “No, baby, no. Fuck. Much as that sounds alluring, let’s save exhibitionism for our missions overseas. Strangers. Not people I might see later.”

“People you might-”

“CIA following us, love. Just in case. Friends of mine.”

She went still, jerked back to stare at him. “Friends of yours are following us?”

“In case we - need help.”

She tilted her head.

“You know.” He sighed, stroked his thumbs along her thighs where he held her down on his lap. “Shit happens with us, baby. Extra protection if we needed it. Made you confront the places you’d been last night. And I didn’t know how bad it’d be. For you or - well, for that asshole either. So-”

“You had CIA agents following us all day.” She sat back, bumping the steering wheel, scraping a hand through her hair and undoing the knot. “So - when you shot him...”

He scowled. “Are you asking if he’s okay?”

“No, I’m asking if you had your lackeys cleaning up your mess.”

He set his jaw.

She softened. “You did. Of course you did.” She slumped down into him, an arm winding behind his neck and her lips feathering along his neck. “You’re a beautiful man, you know that? So beautiful to me.”

He was blushing, but he tightened his embrace, kissed her cheek roughly. “Alright, alright. Let’s be on our way, love. Colin’s messaged me their route, and we’ll follow a little more slowly.”

She nudged a last kiss in against his jaw and withdrew, retreating to her own side of the car, folding herself back into the seat once more. He kept his eyes on her until she had the seatbelt fastened, and then he reached out and took her hand.

“That’s two down. Three to go. The hotel tonight - you can try all three if you don’t drop unconscious on me.”

Her lips twitched. “Right.”

“I wouldn’t be laughing if I was you, sweetheart. You let that asshole fuck you - poorly - against a fucking brick wall. And you would have again in his apartment had he not fucking passed out. This isn’t a laughing matter.”

The amusement wiped off her face; she stared wide-eyed at him.

He viciously put the car into gear. “If I’m not abjectly grief-stricken over you, I’m fucking furious. And you will know it.”

\-----

Castle was still nursing a healthy anger, not just because she’d fucked someone else, but more because she’d let someone unworthy fuck her. It wasn’t the choosing, because the choosing hadn’t even really been conscious on her part. It was precisely that unchoosing that made him so fucking furious.

She had wanted to be abused. She had wanted to be taken poorly, to be ill-used. And that fucking gnawed at him.

As the level of his anger grew, the grief diminished until he was gripping the wheel and cursing every vehicle on the road. When they got through the tunnel and were finally heading upstate, he was throttling the fucking steering wheel.

“Enough,” Kate snapped. “Pull over.”

He gave her a glittering look and checked his mirrors. The interstate was in the middle of rush hour afternoon traffic, everyone escaping the city, and not only was it not good time to pull over, he sure as fuck didn’t want to lose their hard-won place in the line.

But Kate leaned in over the console and cupped his groin with tight fingers, making him gasp. “I said. Pull. Over. Right the fuck now, Castle. Number three on your fucking list.”

He grit his teeth and shook his head like a dog, balefully staring at the road ahead of them. “No. It’s impossible to get out of the city right now and we just got through-”

She squeezed his balls and he squeaked. So fucking unmanly. She was already reaching across and sliding down his zipper, making it hurt so good.

“Kate.”

“I’m deep throating you whether you stop or not. So you can either fucking wreck us, Rick, or you can pull over and enjoy yourself.”

His nostrils flared but he made his choice.

Castle put on his turn signal to change lanes and fucking muscled the Subaru from the fast lane to the far shoulder, forcing his way through a gridlocked interstate system. They got honked at, they got looks, they got the middle finger and irate tirades, but Castle had her hand still fondling his balls and the determination of all his impressive anger.

His cock was a tower from the nest of his groin, and she had already taken him out and begun pumping him with her hand, making him all the more impressive.

When he had pulled off on the shoulder, Kate released him, sat back. He groaned, thumping his head back into the headrest again and again, trying to catch his breath and gather the last threads of his control.

She opened the passenger door.

His head snapped up and he glared at her. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

She slid out of the Subaru to stand beside the raised SUV, the door wide open, and she gave the interstate a careful study with her eyes. His fury was burning now, igniting in his chest and pumping fire down through his cock, but she set her jaw and turned back to him then.

“Your guys still following us?”

“No. Left us at the city.” He reached across, thinking to snag her, but she stepped back just enough. “Beckett. Get the fuck back in the car and do something about this.”

“Passenger seat. Crawl over. More room this way.” She gestured with both hands like she was encouraging to her, like he was Wyatt standing on the side of the pool afraid to jump in. “Come on, Rick. Promise it’ll be better like this.”

“In the passenger seat,” he said, shaking his head. What was she going to do, get in the fucking floorboard?

Oh. Actually. If he pushed the seat way back, then she could kneel between his legs and he could lift his hips into her and do a little mild thrusting, her mouth so wet and hot around him.

“Now, Castle.”

He released his seat belt and climbed over the center console, folded his limbs into the passenger seat. But when he reached down to push the seat back, she slapped his hand away and gripped his knees, tugging.

“Turn to me.”

“What-”

She grabbed hold of his cock and he yelped, twisting towards her as she stood in the open doorway at the passenger’s side. His hips bucked without his say, and the difference in height of the chassis of the SUV and Kate standing on the dirt and cracked pavement of the shoulder was just enough to put her breasts right at his knees.

“Kate,” he gritted out. “You need to crawl in here and-”

She braced herself with a hand on his thigh and leaned forward.

“No-” he gasped.

And she swallowed him down in full view of the whole fucking interstate.

\-----

Castle’s hips bucked.

He groaned and clutched a fistful of her hair, tried not to, tried not to. Oh God.

Her mouth was so fucking wet. And strong. Shit. So damn strong around him. Her hand circled his base and pumped him, squeezing, and her mouth swallowed him down, full to her throat.

Fuck. Fuck.

“Beck-ett,” he gritted out. His eyes rolled back.

He tried to lift her head. Tried to pull her up - fuck, she had gone down to her knees, oh God. Oh, fuck, fuck, he was already about to lose it.

Her tongue against his balls made him shout.

Her fingers squeezing his shaft, pumping up and down with her saliva, her mouth circling his head and coming back down him, fast and hot.

His body was in riot. Writhing against her teeth. Gasping and coming up as she hummed. Thrusting without his say. 

He gripped the overhead handle and realized he was fucking her mouth.

Fuck.

He tightened his grip in her hair and saw stars, her mouth so narrow and hot. She suckled hard, moaning around him, and now he couldn’t control himself at all, now he was thrusting fiercely, meeting the bobbing of her head with the force of his hips, fucking her, fucking her, fuck-

He orgasmed with a cry, pouring his seed down her throat. She swallowed fast and thick, sucking at him, greedy on his cock, massaging his balls to pull every last drop out of him.

He collapsed back to the seat and she licked a long stripe against his softening cock, lifted from her knees to lean in against his own.

He groaned at the press of her breasts, the coiled and taut strength of her body as she came close, tucking him in once more.

“Fuck,” he gasped, head tilted back but his eyes fixed on her mouth. “You’re a fucking goddess.”

Instead of that evil grin, that knowing lift of her eyebrow, her face changed rapidly - shock giving way to thunderstruck grief. Her head twisted away, her body beginning to move-

He croaked her name and surged forward, caught her by her elbows before she could run.

“No,” he growled, holding her against him, his fly still unzipped, his blood still zipping with the aftereffects of her mouth. “No. You stay. You stay.”

“I’m no goddess,” she gasped, struggling. “I’m not even-”

“Don’t you fucking dare. Get the fuck in this car and drive, Beckett. Right now.” He hauled her off her feet and into his lap, began folding her limbs into the seat, into the car, without any care for how or where. He shut the door on her and began shoving her over the center console.

She was putting up a half-hearted fight, a little too much grief in her resistance.

He got her ass over the center console and in the seat and he gripped her by the back of the neck when she moved to grab the door handle.

“No. You fucking stay. You just unmanned me, and now these are the consequences. You fucking drive until I can recover from that.” He took a ragged breath and released her neck. “Fuck. I will damn well call the woman who goes down on me on the side of the interstate and deep throats me until my balls are blue a God-damn goddess if I fucking want to.”

She pulled her knees up into her chest, shot him a sideways look.

“Now drive.”

\-----


	11. Chapter 11

She didn’t know how he knew. 

How did he knew when she had no idea?

But driving centered her, the feeling of movement and getting out, away, the concentration it took to navigate rush hour traffic and escaping the city. The farther they got, the better she had a handle on herself, and the more miles she blazed, the easier it got to control the shaking.

Not only did the driving give her control once more, but he talked.

He talked and let his hand stroke and wander along her thigh, thoroughly distracting but only in that so very good way. Her body tingled where he wasn’t, and sparked where he was, and if she hadn’t already been drenched from having him in her mouth and swallowing his rich seed, she’d be soaked again.

As it was, her breasts grew heavy and her pulse beat so hard it made her wrists and inner thighs feel alive alive, made her neck sensitive, her nipples almost unbearable. And as he touched, he talked, and her talked about her and what he loved, and it was excruciating, it was wonderful, she didn’t know how he knew so clearly that only by touching her could he - at all - really touch her.

Her heart had burst its seams and spilled its guts out on the floor and yet he was caressing each messy entrail and putting it all back together somehow. 

She wanted to sit in his lap and ride his hand as he whispered these simple but lovely things into her hair, the back of her neck, behind her ear. She wanted to feel his fingers inside her as he said when you fall asleep and your bottom lip catches in your teeth and your hand unfurls near your face in trust.

Every other breath was a shaky inhale as he detailed his favorites - her legs, the angle of her knees when she was tilted his way on the couch, that stupid television show the boys became so riveted to that she would sneak in touches, the way she had of smiling without smiling at all so that he felt like he was being let in on a great and wonderful secret.

How did he see her so impossibly beautiful?

If only she could believe in his story. If only he spun nonfiction instead of fiction. If-

“And the bump of your cheek against mine,” he sighed, cutting into her spiraling thoughts with the stroke of a finger between her legs. She mewled in the seat, entirely done in, broadaxed by him. “I knew from the beginning it was the special, purposeful way you told the boys you claimed them, you loved them, and you did it to me. I never had to wonder. I always knew. You had found a way to give them you in that place, despite how Black tired to rip them from you and you from them. You gave them yourself when they had no right to it, being foisted on you as his experiments-”

“Stop,” she husked, her heart twisting on a spike. “I can’t.”

“You don’t have to. Just know that I saw you, I felt you give yourself to them, intentionally, purposefully, love them. And then you turned your face to me and you did the very same. And how could I not know?”

She chewed fiercely on her lip, struggling to shut out John Black from her head once more. Once the genie was out of its bottle, once his name was brought up - and those years - when she was like this, it was so difficult to shake the chill fog of that man’s voice in her head.

“We can’t keep from saying it. These things need to be said.”

“You didn’t say therapy,” she whined. She heard it anyway and gripped the wheel, squirmed in her seat. “And no sex for therapy, you said.”

“This isn’t therapy. This is the man who was given the best oral sex of his life telling the woman he’s ridiculously in love with that she matters to him, that her life isn’t forfeit, that she can sex me up any damn time she likes but even if she didn’t, this doesn’t go away. Loving you. Wanting more for you. Protecting you as my own heart.”

She swallowed hard. It wasn’t fair; he was fighting dirty, tracing his fingers around and around and making her crave him in every pore of her skin.

And when her pores opened up for him, she drank down every word he spoke. And he knew that, and he had promised no therapy when she was vulnerable to him, but he was doing it anyway.

“It’s not therapy. It’s a love poem, a sonnet unrhymed - I suck at rhyming - I also suck at meter and that shit, iambic whatever, so it’s just my guts shaken out over everything. And how I can’t keep silent about you now that I’ve seen, brutally been made to see, just how little you think of yourself when you’re doing a runner.”

“It’s panic,” she mumbled. “An attack. Call it that for a reason.”

“But you’re still there, aren’t you? Still in that mindset that would make you dash.”

“Yeah,” she admitted, twisting the wheel in her hands. But she didn’t have to look at him when she drove; she could use the effort of concentration as an excuse for keeping her eyes glued to the road.

“So long as you’re there, stuck in irrationality, and not here, with me, I get to keep talking.”

“You didn’t use to,” she reminded him. Her voice was tight in her throat. Having him talk at her like this was disconcerting, uncomfortable. He had never been this pushy and aggressive with her during her dark times. He had promised long ago that he wouldn’t hold her, and yet now here he was, holding her.

“No, I didn’t, and look where I let it lead us. By not leashing you to me, I’ve given you the wrong impression that I don’t want you leashed to me - desperately want, so very desperately want you to feel you can stay.”

“I know I can stay-”

“Not my permission.” He growled and two fingers pressed into the seam of her jeans, made her hips shy in the seat. “Not permission to stay. But you. Clinging to me as I cling to you. Cleaving. That’s the better word. Not cling - we could never be that, neither one of us are built to cling. But cleave.”

“I don’t know what that means but Bible stuff.”

“Yes.”

“Yes?”

His fingers twitched and she shivered, though her eyes were resolute on the road.

Which meant she missed it when he leaned in, didn’t feel him there until his breath skirted her jaw and tickled her neck. He pressed his mouth to her skin there and sucked lightly at her neck until she knew he was marking her.

“Cleave. Archaic use, Bible stuff as you said,” he hummed. Lecturing her in that voice that made her cunt gush for him, that even now became so alert and aware and vivid for him as he spoke to her like he was teaching her a lesson. “Adhere strongly to, be involved with so strongly as to be faithful, loyal, attached.”

His teeth nipped and his tongue rolled up along the place he’d claimed.

“And modern use?” she whispered. 

“Bulldoze, carve, plow, sever.”

“Oh.”

“Modern man is looking more and more like an idiot, going backwards and making the world mean its opposite. What works for us, I’m seeing now, is when I claim you like the archaic man I am, take you, possess you. You’re mine, and no one else’s, and no one is allowed to have you like I have you, and you damn well better cleave to me.”

“That was - like getting married.”

His fingers rolled against her clit.

She mewled and her hips stuttered up.

“I need you to pull over, Beckett.”

“Wh-why?” She was shaking again, for entirely new reasons.

“So I can cleave you with my tongue.”

Oh, hell.

\-----

She groaned and dug her heels into his thighs, her hips pressing up and her hands clutching his ears. 

Grinding into his face.

He was tracing letters across her cunt with his tongue, the clever and wicked ways his mouth moved against her like a spell. She was caught, trapped, and even though he’d pushed her into the backseat and crouched in the floorboards to get at her, she felt she could come out of her skin like this.

Stop being this. And be - more. Other.

Else.

Electric.

Oh, God. His tongue. Her legs draped over the edge of the seat so that her feet dug into his thighs and her knees were hooked over his shoulders and his palms pressed her open to his mouth.

He loved her.

She loved him.

Cleave didn’t mean to cling, not at all. It meant being two people who had once, somewhere somehow someway, been one. Two broken apart pieces that longed to be one.

Her body urged towards his, as if the bared vulnerable openness of her cunt could press her soul into his through the joy of his tongue.

And in reverse, his tongue bathed her with his soul.

Oh, God, she was outside of herself with it. Sentimental and soulsick and using words that weren’t hers. His. His words, the one with the mouth, as he pressed them into her with his tongue and the flowered inside her cunt and bloomed explosively brilliantly entirely through her whole body.

She came with a cry, curling up around his mouth, cradling his head between her hands, her thighs, her cunt. Her orgasm shook her, all through, and yet his mouth still worked her, his fingers petting her folds, pushing inside, and she was coming again, rolling back to back just like that.

When she opened her eyes, he was pressed in above her, his fingers stroking her cheeks and back into her hair and she realized there had been tears. He dipped his head and kissed her, lips warm and wet and tasting like herself, and her eyes dragged upwards, lashes clinging together and obscuring her vision of him.

He smoothed her hair sideways across her forehead, smiled. “Can I say it a lot or do you need a break?”

“What,” she husked, flushing deeply when she heard how broken her voice sounded. She must have screamed. She didn’t remember it, only the way orgasms like that from his mouth on her possessed her.

“I love you.”

Her breath caught and ripped free again, and he had to sweep his thumbs under her eyes and wipe tears once more. She shook her head in his hold but he climbed onto the backseat with her and tucked himself over and around and at her side, kissing her cheeks, her temple, her nose, her tears.

“I know you, fully know you in ways most people never dream, thought, memory, mood, soul. Not in spite of. Because of. Because.”

“Stop,” she rasped. He shook his head and cupped the side of her face, but the heel of his hand was hard against her cheek and kept her there, fiercely. 

“I won’t stop. If you need a break, a space to breathe, then I can give you that. But I won’t stop. Loving you. Saying it. Trying to make you see how I see you. Just a measure of how I see you, love, my heart.”

She wrapped her fingers around his wrist and turned her head to kiss his pulse point there. Her lashes dusted his skin and she felt him tremble.

Remembered.

She reached between them and found him hard for her, and what a miracle it felt to her in this moment, how he ached for her even still. She unzipped his pants and he helped, shifting and lifting a hip to push the material away, give them both enough clearance.

“Fuck me,” she murmured at his neck. “Fuck me and don’t - stop. Don’t stop. Just - love me, Rick. I don’t know how to do-”

“I can love you,” he hushed. His fingers split her folds and held her open for him. She teased herself with the angry head of his cock, the desperate thickness in her hand, before she finally guided him to her cunt.

“Cleave,” she whispered, begging.

He grunted and sank deep, all in one continuous rolling movement of his hips. She groaned when he bottomed out inside her, so fiercely glad to have him there, to have him. Cleaved.

“There’s a line. Somewhere,” he said, his mouth moving against her collarbone, down to her breast. The way he sampled at her breast like taking tastes of her. “A line that says, and all my joyous body.”

Kate gasped, crying out at his movement inside her, a little giddy with the poetry. “I know - I know it. She’s dead. She’s dead in her grave.”

“Oh God,” he moaned. “Not-”

“I found more joy in sorrow than you could find in joy,” she cried, laughing as it came to her, the end lines, the haughty and triumphant lines. “Oh, God, I love you, Rick Castle.”

He growled and snapped his hips, fucked her hard enough to make her flinch. She laughed again and clutched his shoulders, kissed his mouth where he was still growling. He took a biting kiss from her, rocking his hips as he braced himself on his knees and forearms, pressing his body down against hers.

“All my joyous body,” she hummed, loving it, loving him. Only Castle would quote death at her and only she would be seduced by it. “Because of you. Oh God. Oh, there.”

He cursed her name and held her down against the bench seat, and she kept thrusting upwards to meet him, his cock strong and hard as he furrowed inside her. She was so strung out on him, and yet so grounded, so very here because of him. Entirely aware, present, living.

She’d never been so free. To say the words and know she meant them in ways no one could possible understand but them. To name the feelings that coursed and flooded through her, to find a realness to them because of that name.

“I’m so in love with you,” she breathed. “So love you. Love you. Love-”

She snapped off with a cry, burst apart in dizzying orgasm, clinging - cleaved - loyal to him in more ways no other could ever know.

\-----

“Your laughter,” he smiled. Filled his lungs with the rich scent of sex against her neck. “Your laughter in the middle of sex is the most amazing thing.”

“Shut up,” she mumbled, laughing a little even then. She sounded exhausted.

He didn’t want to leave the cove of her body, the warm wet grip of her cunt around his cock. He gave himself a moment, kissed the angle of her jaw, and then he pulled them both upright on the backseat.

She shivered, and he tugged her t-shirt down to keep out the draft, pulled her closer to him on his lap. She wriggled, he gasped and clutched at her as she rocked over him, all her joyous body.

What a fucking stupid thing to say. He had actually quoted poetry at her while pushing inside her body, and yet - holy shit - this was who he was now. She made him quote inadequate poetry about death in the middle of amazing sex, and he couldn’t even really feel ashamed of it.

Beckett looped an arm around his neck and pressed her chest to his, laid her cheek at his shoulder. “It was funny.”

“I didn’t mean to be,” he murmured, stroking her hair down where it had fallen out of the bun. “But every time I hit your cervix, you laughed. And I could feel it around me. Amazing.”

She jerked upright, eyes wide. “Oh.” Her mouth opened, closed, and his chest swelled with the way she looked at him. Possessive, but also made new. A new thing. “Oh, that’s - oh.”

“You have a narrow, tight body, sweetheart, and when I’m inside you, it takes some fucking fantastic work to get all the way in. But you always do open right up for me, your body like a mouth, devouring.”

She flushed pink and her lips twitched. “Mm. That’s why you said rock my hips.”

“What?”

“The first time,” she smiled. “Our first time. My first time. Ever. You told me exactly what to do.”

“I did?” He wrinkled his nose. “What a damn idiot. It’s always the most fun when you get creative.”

She shook her head, her fingers splaying at his chest under his shirt, tickling. “No, not at all an idiot. I needed that. It was hot, you being demanding. Rock your hips, baby. Your voice in my head now. Rock your hips, baby, that’s it. And you pushed a little deeper and I could feel it - oh, everywhere, how filled up it made me.”

He was simply stunned. He wasn’t sure she had ever said it quite like that or with such - clear and shining adoration in her eyes. Four years ago, he’d been beside himself for wanting her, and he had taken her finally in their bed, trying to be gentle without being patronizing, and to know that it had worked-

God.

She slayed him. In the best ways. She absolutely killed him.

Castle cupped her cheeks and smoothed his thumbs under her eyes, entranced by her. She tilted her head as if in askance, but then her lips smoothed out and flattened in that knowing smirking.

Of course he was hardening for her once more. Of course. How could he contain himself after something like that?

“Rock your hips, baby,” he murmured.

She let out a breath of laughter and did just that, the slow roll of her pelvis that ground her clit against him and seated him a little more deeply inside her.

He groaned and wrapped an arm at her lower back, spreading his palm wide to feel her movement. “That’s it, love. You’re very good at this.”

“I had an excellent teacher,” she said breathlessly. Her lips ghosted his. “You were my first, oh, love, oh God, that feels so good.” Her mouth opened at his cheek, cheek to cheek now, and she rolled and rocked in his lap, so intensely gorgeous, so intensely pleasurable, that he had trouble connecting her words to meaning. “My first, my first, oh God. And no matter - no matter how stupid and destructive and hurtful I was - fu-u-uck - you’re my only, Rick. My only-”

She cried out, stiffening in his lap, her eyes brilliantly wide open as if she was fighting against her own orgasm to keep their connection.

He gripped her ass and thrust. She groaned, still fluttering and contracting around him, and he arched his hips and drove inside her repeatedly, forcefully.

It was punishment. Prolonging her orgasm, making her raw with the stretch of him, the heft of him, the thrust of his cock into her.

No one else. Only. 

“Come for me,” she moaned. “Come inside me. Please. Fuck me so hard you can’t help it, you can’t hold back.”

He gripped her and groaned, attacked her mouth with the ferocity that clawed through him, sucking on her tongue and biting at her lip, tearing away when she whimpered. Her hips still rocked, a tighter and faster rhythm, keeping up with him, grinding down on him.

“One more,” he growled. “One more.”

She keened his name, shaking her head, her legs trembling even as she moved to obey him.

“One more, Kate Beckett. Because you’re mine only. Because you’re mine.”

She cursed him, a sob caught in her throat, and he drilled her with his cock, forcing her down on him, wanting her. But she started twisting her hips at the downward plunge, and he gasped, his balls tightening every time, his lungs in an impossible knot.

He was going to come.

“Fuck,” he shouted. “Fuck. Kate. Right now.”

She mewled and began to shake, and then she was shattering phenomenally, crying out and clinging to him, her body so fucking tight, contracting, clutching, begging him.

He climaxed in a red haze, his fury exploding out with his come, filling her up even as he kept her pressed tight to him, their exhaustion already collapsing them down into each other.

Her hips rolled one last time and went still, fluttering aftershocks running through both of them, and he drew his arms around her and sank his face into her neck.

“I love you,” she croaked.

All the breath left him.

He really - he fucking wouldn’t - cry right now.

No.  
Damn it.

\-----

She woke to his fingers stroking softly at her forehead, untangling hair from her eyelashes. She stared up at him and for a moment, it was all sex stoned numbness, a strange sense of feeling him tender around her, and then the realization she didn’t deserve it.

She stiffened, intent on somehow making it right, (it could not be made right at all), but his thumb caught the edge of her eyelid and she was momentarily blinded. And then her stomach growled with her flinching movement, and Castle was chuckling softly like this was any other day, any other moment after, any other connection.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured. His kiss was more than perfunctory, his kiss was warm and humid and lovely. “I keep forgetting you need food, my poor regular-human love.”

She choked on her next breath, slumped down into him, defeat mingling with exhaustion. He cradled her against his chest and shifted on the seat, kissed the corner of her eye where it was still watering.

“Food and sleep, sweetheart. Yeah? A bed to do this in. Make love to you until we’re both blind.”

There was something enticing about fucking him blind, herself, as if it would release her. She was starving, and it was rolling through her now, but she felt messy and sock-mouthed, and now fluid was leaking from between her legs.

“Hey there, love,” he murmured. “You with me yet?” His fingers stroked down her thighs and between her legs. “Let me get this.”

For some reason, shame burned hotly through her guts as he used his t-shirt between her legs, and when he tossed it to the floorboards, she unfolded her legs from him and sank back to the seat, trying to find her underwear. Everything else.

“Kate?”

She shook her head. “Tired. I am - yeah - just really tired.”

“No,” he said, fingers closing around her wrist as she put a foot into the leg of her panties. “I know you better than that. We were laughing, you looked happy again. But now-”

She chewed on her bottom lip, pulled her panties up and lifted her hips to straighten them. 

“Kate. You have to talk. If not to me, then someone else.”

She froze.

He released her wrist. “I’m serious. We’ll find someone at the CIA. We have whole teams of psychologists who are trained agents on top of things.”

“They can ‘handle’ me?” She chewed hard on her bottom lip and tugged her pants up.

“They can handle anything. And they can be read in on the real life details.” He snagged her by the back of her neck and made her look at him. His eyes were fierce slate. “You have to talk. If not me, then-”

“I don’t deserve to be happy.”

His jaw dropped.

She jerked away from him and found her shirt, though the bra was missing (and her panties were still in his possession somewhere). 

He sat forward and she could feel him beside her, quietly arranging his own clothes, putting himself back together. 

She shifted on the seat, pressed her elbows to her side. She waited for whatever came next.

He rubbed both hands down his thighs. “Do you think I deserve to be happy?” Castle said quietly.

She jerked upright. “Of course I-”

“You make me happy.”

Her breath caught.

“You make me happy. I don’t fucking care if you think you deserve it or not.”

She nodded tightly, her chest in a vise. 

“That’s not true, really. I care because it makes me sick. You don’t get to ruin this because you have no fucking self-confidence. I won’t let you.”

Kate swallowed, nodded again.

“Stop,” he growled, grabbing her by the shoulder and shaking her. “Stop leaving. Stay. Open your damn mouth and talk to me.”

She lifted her eyes to him, but she had nothing. She never did. What were words in the face of crippling-

“Tell me you love me.”

“I love you,” she whispered.

“That’s all. That’s the end and the beginning. Don’t you get that?”

She wrapped her arms tighter around her torso and nodded roughly. “I - I know it whitewashes a-”

“It’s not whitewash. Oh, I’m fucking furious with you. But you’re forgiven. Now stop fucking asking for forgiveness, stop saying you’re sorry. It’s not whitewash, it’s love.”

She tried to find the words, whatever it was that would set things right again, but nothing - there was nothing. 

“Talk to me, Kate, or so help me God-”

“I need - what’s three and four and five?”

He sighed and sank back against the seat. “Penance, right. Alright.” Suddenly he sat forward and scooped something up from the floor, shoved it at her.

Her bra.

She studied the black and tan - the original he’d bought for her four years ago, her favorite - and closed her fingers around it. 

“Penance. Nothing less than what you deserve.”

She cut her eyes to him. Why did that sound so tender in his mouth?

He shifted and drew the plaid shirt on over his bare chest, the undershirt still crumpled on the floorboards. He kept his eyes on the interstate, dressing quickly.

She snaked the bra on under her shirt, hooked the clasps, turned it around. When she moved to draw up the straps, Castle turned back to her and took over, his fingers gentle, soft. 

“I’m taking you to dinner,” he murmured, caressing her bare shoulder under the shirt. “Feeding you up so you’ll last for me.” He leaned in and kissed her neck just above the line of her shirt. “We’ll drive a few miles down the road, just to make up time. We’ll rent a hotel room where we can be private, where your screams won’t be heard.”

She lifted her gaze and his whole demeanor was soft towards her even while she saw the knife’s edge in his eyes. He straightened her shirt himself, both hands, arranging her clothes.

“I’m going to have to bind you,” he said carefully. “You better make your peace with it, love, because you’re mine. All night. Do exactly as I say. You hear me?”

“Yes,” she whispered.

And then her stomach growled riotously, and his lips twitched, and all that serious and sober regard broke just like that.

She sighed, restless energy rubbing her like friction. Like it was all a facade. The mask did no good, the game. This was real. She kept fucking things up. She kept-

Castle grinned and slung his arm around her neck and dragged her down against his side. “I can be what you need, Kate. You might not think so. But I can, for your sake. You’ll see tonight. I’m going to punish you, sweetheart.”

\----


	12. Chapter 12

She was restless again, which wasn’t a good sign for how the rest of this night would go. Castle had her drive, unwilling to give her the chance to open up her passenger door and just roll out - not that he thought that was likely. But better safe than sorry.

“Here, down here,” he directed, leaning forward as they exited the interstate. When he glanced at her, she was gripping the wheel and working her jaw, balanced on the edge. “There’s a steak place.”

“No steak.”

“Fish tacos?” he suggested, the next thing down.

“Okay.”

“You’ll eat.”

“Try.”

“You’ll eat,” he insisted, sitting back in his seat as she stopped at the light. She said nothing to that and the light turned green and she drove forward, turning into the taco place. It was a sit down restaurant, not fast food, so at least there was that. Plus vegetables, protein, all good stuff that wouldn’t be too heavy.

How long since she’d eaten? Over twenty-four hours. He hadn’t thought to remedy that last night, and with her throwing up, he hadn’t expected her to be in the mood. He’d grown used to her haphazard eating habits, and while he knew she didn’t always eat enough, she did try.

Well, a pattern of self-sabotage said she would have stopped trying. And he had known that. He should’ve paid attention.

She parked at the taco place and released her seat belt, glanced at him. She was chewing on her bottom lip. “I don’t know if I’m up for this.”

“Eating or being in public?” Mattered which one she was talking about.

“Yeah.”

“Well, too bad. But we’ll be in and out,” Castle promised. He pushed open his door and got out, assuming she would follow. Half the time with Beckett, taking the lead and pushing forward gave her enough of a kickstart to get moving herself.

When he glanced back, she was coming after him, automatically locking the doors with the key fob, straightening her shirt sleeves over the bandages on her arms. She looked tired, and he reminded himself he’d have to be careful. Food would help, in moderation, but so would love.

Just had to be sure he loved her on the sly, loved her in a way that felt like what she thought she deserved (that alley, the brick scraping off the top layer of her skin, the asshole with no moves and no consideration). What she deserved.

Damn. He still wasn’t over it. Over it? He’d never be over it. What had been done to her and all the ways it tainted her life, their life together. The ways it fucked her up, kept broken when all he wanted for her was-

Her hand slid into his, completely arresting his thoughts.

He looked at her and she gave him a tight smile. He squeezed tightly, laced their fingers together. 

She was trying. She took a deep breath, deep. “Thanks for - taking care of me, Rick.”

Hell. 

It just burned through him, how much she fought for every damn scrap of normality, fought for their life and kept fighting even when the darkness was just so dark.

“I like taking care of you. When you let me.” He opened the door for her and she went in ahead of him, and he followed her to the hostess stand, lifted two fingers at the woman behind the podium.

They were led to a table immediately, and when Kate sat down on one side, Castle picked the chair at her side rather than across from her. He sank back, laid his hand over her knee under the table, rubbing softly with two fingers.

Her shoulders came down, her eyelids grew heavy. 

In the same way Kate could soothe the wolf, Castle had discovered he could sometimes soothe her. Didn’t always work, and he had to pick his times, but she was just tired enough right now that it seemed to help. He had the theory that it gave her something to concentrate on, just below her radar, something to unconsciously draw her attention and keep it.

Keep her from straying back to that darkness.

When the waitress came with menus, Kate startled and sat up straight, but instead of tensing, everything being ruined, she grabbed his hand. Attentive, yes, but not yet pushed over the edge.

“Two waters,” he told the waitress, a glance to Kate to confirm. She nodded and the waitress left, and Kate’s shoulders came down again.

Her hand relaxed, released his, but she didn’t shove him off her knee. He resumed the slow circles, and she propped an elbow on the table and sank her chin to the heel of her hand.

“You okay?”  
“Mm.” She let out a sigh. “Best it’s gonna get.”

“Until tonight.”

Her cheeks went pink, her eyes slid to his and away again. “Guess so?”

“Better not be a question.”

She huffed and rolled her chin his way, and then for some reason, she studied him intently, biting the inside of her cheek so that he could see the way she worried it.

“What,” he said.

“What... um what can I expect tonight?”

He grinned.

She looked away, rolling her eyes. 

Felt a little more normal now. “I told you. Bind your wrists. No gag, I like to hear you.”

Her cheeks went a little more pink and she sat up a little straighter. Licked her lips.

“You’ll do as I say, for once in your life.”

She gave an indignant squawk, eyebrows raising, and he laughed. She narrowed her eyes, punched his shoulder just as the waitress returned with their water.

When the woman had gone again, Kate peeled paper from her straw and gave him a long look, something saucy struggling to the surface of her eyes.

He liked that.

She stuck her straw in her mouth, chewed it as she looked at him. “Alright. I’ll do as you say. When does it start?”

He sat up a little straighter himself. “How about now?”

“Is that a command, or are you asking?”

He set his jaw, narrowed his eyes at her. “It starts now, Beckett.” He leaned in, knocked into her wrist to jostle her chin off her hand. “Sit up, baby, sit up straight.”

She blinked, but then she did as he said, straightening her spine and taking a breath. Not just for the sake of her posture, but it really did thrust her chest forward, giving him a tantalizing shadow of her breasts.

“Better, love.” He nodded to the water. “Take a sip. Need to keep you hydrated.”

\-----

He knew the waitress was judging. She had heard scraps of his commands to Beckett over the course of their meal, and the woman was definitely judging and weighing him, finding him severely lacking.

At the moment, Castle was distinctly and uncomfortably aware of not measuring up.

But it was in the entirely opposite direction. He wasn't - he didn't want to be this man, least of all this man with Kate. He had struggled for four years to tamp down those darker impulses, to control his need for control, to lash it with cords and bind it if he couldn't exorcise it entirely.

And now he was taking it off the leash, this sense of dominating the thing he loved (oh God, thething, already he was possessing, owning her in a sense he had never wanted to do to her). Now he was letting his need for mastery taint his words and stain his tone.

Kate was responding.

She had eaten the entire fish taco with her fingers, piece by piece, with Castle pinching the nerve at her knee when she balked. She had eaten, and that was the most important thing here.

Ends justified the means. (His father had said that continuously, one of his favorite sayings that allowed him to dismiss the invasive and painful surgeries he performed on Alex and Ben, that allowed him to absolve whatever conscience he had when it came to what he'd done to all of them, and here Castle was taking it into himself and absolving his own soul of what he was doing to her now).

"Water," he reminded her. His voice had grown darker, attenuated by the restaurant and the waitress's condemnation, but still demanding enough that she had fallen into subservience in a sickeningly swift amount of time.

She sipped her water, choked down a mouthful that literally made her choke. He didn't offer his help, didn't pat her back, but she had it under control once more, and like a good girl, went back for more. Another sip that soothed her irritated throat, and then another. 

And then she looked up at him with those eyes that begged to be petted, pleaded with him to love her, to say she was good, to validate her worth.

"Good girl," he whispered, his heart thrashing in his chest.

She glowed.

He had spent so long not going here, so damn long wrestling with it. He had, in essence, kept himself back from her because of it. She felt that, somewhere in herself, she felt him withdrawing when their sex became too rough and his base nature reared its ugly head - of course she felt him. But how else would she have interpreted his retreat as anything other than his removing himself from her? So of course she did a runner. Of course she sabotaged herself. 

Eastman had been prophetic. She'd been too young and too wounded for this kind of relationship, but it had already been too late. She'd needed him, and he'd desperately needed her, and they had fed each other in it and now this is was where they were and he had to own that.

He wasn't allowed to withhold from her. She was already in that darkness, that deep darkness that seemed to breathe unmaking into her soul; she was already there. If he truly loved her as selflessly as he claimed, he would have to follow. 

He was following her to darkness. He loved her entirely, wholly, obsessively, and if his love was going to do her any damn good, he had to be the thing he didn't want to be.

He had to be the thing he was. 

"You're done," he told her, arresting her movement. The fork trembled, the bite she'd been about to force down was dropped. He lowered her hand to the table. "I don't want you full. Just enough energy to burn tonight."

She blinked.

"Go to the bathroom. I'll pay. You still have the keys?"

She nodded, and he saw her hands were trembling, that she tucked them into her lap out of sight. 

"Good girl. You'll drive us. I'll navigate. Do you understand?"

"Yes."

"Very good. Remember, Becks, I like to hear you, so you need to use your voice. Nodding ain't gonna cut it."

"Yes," she husked. Her eyes flashed to his hands and up again, to his face, and it was like a curtain opening to the night. All that darkness swirling in her.

And he'd been afraid to go, afraid to sail off into that darkness with only his love for her as guidance. 

What a damn coward. She deserved better. He would be better.

He could be better.

"Bathroom," he told her, nodding towards the back. "Do not throw up."

"I won't," she whispered.

"Meet me at the car when you're done."

She nodded, croaked out an affirmative and when he stood in respect, she stood as well. He watched her leave the table, threading her way towards the bathroom in back, and then he picked up the check the waitress had left on the table.

His heart was like a frightened rabbit in his chest, leaning out after her. He wanted so badly not to let her go alone, not to make her walk through the restaurant back to him, but now that he'd slipped the leash, now that his father's conditioning was roaring towards the forefront, he could admit that something else had him now.

Was trying to wrest control from him.

He wanted her to suffer for it. He wanted her to love him so much she suffered.

And even though his palms were clammy and he was dizzy when he turned, he left her alone and went to pay the bill.

\-----

While Kate drove five miles over the speed limit on the interstate, Castle called up the list of CIA safe houses in upstate New York. The screen of his phone had gotten cracked on this last mission, and that had been his fault (not supposed to have brought it with him, not even to the safe drop in Berlin where he'd started). But he found exactly what he was looking for on the second page of listings, filed under cabin, remote.

Ideal. 

"Take exit 136," he told her. "It's coming up in five miles."

"Okay," she answered, and there was something so damn strange about having what should have been a normal conversation in these voices, these personas.

His stern and unyielding and hers entirely willing. And aroused. He could definitely hear her excitement - her dread - in the tenor and tremble of her voice.

"I can smell you, wet, in the car," he told her.

She sucked in a breath.

He didn't look at her, studied the landscape minutely to keep from caressing her, touching her in ways he longed to. For. The soft seduction gave him such a pleasing, intense reward when it came to Kate Beckett, but he knew it would be false this time. 

Just as it had been earlier in the car when he'd made them pull over and they had laughed together - false. Or no, that was unkind. It wasn't false. It was just flimsy. For her, at this moment, it was cheap stuff, laughter and feeling and tenderness. Those things didn't stick with her.

"Turn left at the light," he told her. He didn't ask, didn't reassure either. She made the required turn and followed the posted speed limit and he checked his phone and the attached map image to be sure they were approaching the cabin at the correct side.

The other side was secured with trip wires, so it wouldn't do to come at this the wrong way.

After a few miles, he was more settled in it, easier now to keep his hands to himself. Once, he'd told her about the seduction techniques the team came up with for CIA asset-acquisition, and she'd wrinkled her nose and told him that it was a lot less glamorous than she'd hoped, that forcing himself to get worked up wasn't any good.

Right now he was calling on all his training to not get worked up, to keep a leash over the tendency he had to give way to her and sublimate their emotions into making love. 

She didn't need that right now. She needed this other, darker element. Because of Black. And because of Black, Castle could all to well dwell there.

"Remember Halloween last year," he started, watching their progress on the map. "And the Jekyll and Hyde costume?"

Her breath came out in a tight little exhale. "Y-yes."

She had been afraid. He still didn't know why, had fucking burned it, the whole damn outfit. She had been triggered somehow by that damn costume and he had assumed it was because of the mad scientist concept, the human experiments, and he'd cursed himself for being a complete fool.

But now he wondered if that hadn't been a healthy fear, a good way of exploring things left untouched for too long. Castle's face hadn't even been behind a mask, just make-up from the guys in the wardrobe room, and it had been the half-face painted over his own, the evil and malicious sneer, that he thought now had spooked her so hard.

Two sides. The hypocritical good and bad, the flip of a coin telling her which version she'd get today.

"What-what about it?" she husked.

"Just thinking," he answered. "Pay attention to the road. The turn will be on your right, coming up in the next mile."

She let out a breath that sounded shaky, and he mulled that over. The two sides. The darkness she expected at every turn, under every action. No good deed goes unpunished, she'd said wryly to him on more than one occasion. And he was just now beginning to see how those three years caged had absolutely put paid to that maxim.

She expected to be poorly treated. Not just because her more fucked up reasoning said she deserved it, but because something in her nature looked for the clouds in a sunny sky, or if not looked for them then definitely expected them at any moment.

It was why the sunny skies were made so damn good by her. Why she was so vividly alive and amazingly gorgeously passionate when it was good. Because she held the philosophy that the good was bound to go. That they could hang on to none of this.

And it was true. Wasn't it? Everyone died. The boys wouldn't be five forever, just as they hadn't stayed babies, hadn't stayed toddlers. Things changed, life morphed, the present became the past and the future wasn't certain for anyone. She wasn't wrong.

Mr Hyde. Dr Jekyll. One a good doctor, the other a hideous fiend. And she thought it was only natural that the fiend would come to her.

For this one time only, for these rare - please God let them be rare - seasons of desperation and brokenness, Castle would have to once more become Richard Black, the son of the man who had used her up and tried to throw her away.

And even while it sickened him, surface level sick, there was a deeper part of him that felt set free.

Finally.

To be everything to her. To hold her existence in his hands and be her god.

\-----

Kate folded her hands in her lap and sat very still as he came around the hood of the car. When he opened her door and gestured without a word, she swiveled and put her legs out of the Subaru and slid to the ground.

It was full dark, stars above were so deeply set that there was no shine. The trees whispered insidious things in her ears, but Castle wrapped his hand around her wrist and slammed the driver's door shut.

She was shivering, the cool night air abrading her skin, drifting under her shirt. She had no jacket, just the thin plaid he had sent down for her, jeans with ballet flats because that was justCastle. He never remembered that she was fragile.

He didn't think she was fragile.

Oh. That-

"Move, Beckett."

She snapped out of her own head and swiveled to look at him, the dark scowl on his face like a blood moon. She set forth, moving from dirt drive through the trees and into the clearing. The woods were close, touched the roof of the cabin and the back door, and they made a careful approach to the back deck.

"Stay."

She ground to a halt, pulse thumping hard, and Castle shined the light from his phone towards the deck, swept it over the leaf-strewn wooden planks.

She saw the trip wires glisten like deadly razors and her breath caught. Castle moved forward without her, advancing with confidence, stepping over each one at almost the last minute. She watched his progress with her heart in her throat, and then he bent down near the back window and opened a metal panel set into the wooden deck.

He put his body flat to the planks and reached down into the darkness, and whatever it was he did made the woods come to life behind her. She startled, nearly stepped forward-

"Stop," he hissed.

She froze.

The trip wires glinted, the woods at her back were humming, electric, and she realized he had set some kind of security system. 

Her breath came raggedly, and she glanced behind her shoulder, straining her eyes through the darkness to see.

He was on her before she knew it, and she cried out, astonished to have this looming force in front of her. Castle. His hand wrapped around her wrist once more and she went rigid, panic crawling up her throat as it always did when someone restrained her wrists.

"I told you to fucking stay," he growled. He jerked her forward, and she stumbled, felt his body against her as her own met his. His hand came to her ass and gripped, made her come up on her toes in a breathless little mewl. "When I give you an order, you obey it."

"Y-yes," she got out, closing her eyes to the darkness over his shoulder.

"Now. You need to stay. Right here. I have to turn off the trip wires from inside, and that's going to take a little bit of work, baby. I don't have the key."

"No," she gasped. "Castle-"

He grabbed her by the hair and hauled her into him. She swallowed roughly and clutched his shirt, trembling at the force of him.

"You don't tell me no. You stay where I put you until I get back."

She sucked in a harsh breath, tried again, nodded to show she had heard him. She would. Stay.

He didn't have a key? A CIA safe house wasn't something to fuck with. He didn't have the key and he wanted her to just stay while he-

His hand twisted in her hair and she grunted, knees dipping at the way it spiked pain down through her scalp and into her shoulder blades. 

"You did this," he snarled. "Don't start whimpering over it now."

Her spine straightened, her palms flattened at his chest, releasing him.

He let go of her hair and stepped back, and before she could take a last look at him, he had melted off into the trees, a black shadow among black shadows.

She stayed, shivering in the breath of early winter, and wrapped her arms around herself.

Trip wires and who knew what else out here. He had turned on the perimeter security and she had seen enough in clean-up missions to know Black had installed some nasty shit in that regard. She had seen an enemy agent have his head severed from his body as he'd run from them, and that was what Castle was out there among.

The security system inside would be deadly, built entirely to withhold a siege. She had no idea how he thought he could circumvent that, but maybe turning on the outside security was part of it. 

Kate shivered and gripped her elbows, her stomach churning. Her breath was like ice and her skin was clammy, her feet numb. She'd eaten but it hadn't been nearly enough to offset the last few weeks of shitty personal habits. She swayed with every breath and it was beginning to be work to stay standing.

The woods were entirely too alive at her back. This place was so remote they'd been on a dirt path for the last mile, and it was ten miles back to the main highway. The cabin was solidly built, looked like one room, maybe two, and the back deck held a raised, closed-up hot tub. She had not seen the front, and he had said the front approach was booby-trapped (God, if the back was the safe route-)

She heard a faint hissing and froze. The hissing grew increasingly louder, like rattles on dry leaves, and she wildly scanned the patch of dead grass for snakes.

It was only after too long a moment with her heart beating in her head that she realized it wasn't a rattlesnake but the trip-wires. The trip-wires were descending on motors into the forest floor, like a sprinkler system in a suburban yard.

And then the back door opened and Castle came out under the stars' pale lick. His face was shadows and darkness, but she knew it was him just by the way he walked.

He came down the back steps and right to her, and they stood facing each other for a moment. She couldn't even see his eyes, so deeply were his brows furrowed and throwing his visage in shadow.

"When you get inside, you take off your shoes, your clothes, and get in the shower. It's already running. It's hot, but you're not allowed to adjust the temperature. It's set where I want it. Do you understand?"

"Y-yes."

"Good girl. Now go."

She sucked in a scanty breath and darted forward, taking the steps as quickly as she could and traversing the back deck to the door, escaping the dark woods.

It was only when she had bent over to pull the ballet flat off her heel that she felt Castle at her back. Her whole body shuddered when his fingers trailed the curve of her ass.

They had - done that before. She knew he liked it. Something special. 

She had not quite understood before why it was special, why he might withhold himself from that.

"Don't dawdle, Beckett."

She straightened up, dropping her shoes to the floor, and reached for the hem of her plaid shirt, pulled it right off over her head. Her eyes met his when she was free of it, seeking assurance, and she was shocked to find him studying her body, breasts and belly, his eyes never once rising to meet hers.

Her breath was snatched from her lungs, but she fumblingly unbuttoned her jeans and pushed them down her legs, watching him peruse her.

Not once did he look at her in the face. When he had his fill, he turned and shut the door, and then he walked off.

She was left by her pile of clothes to find the bathroom on her own, called on by the white noise of the shower running.

\-----


	13. Chapter 13

“Shit.” The water was scalding. She skittered to one side, wincing as it burned, her flesh turning bright red and burning out the numbness. He forgot sometimes, forgot she couldn’t keep up with him, that she wasn’t like them. Wasn’t super.

Fuck, it was hot.

She tilted her head back and scraped her fingers through her hair, wincing as the water struck her forearms. The spray blinded her and she closed her eyes, took a shaky breath, water sliding down her face like tears.

“You’re done. Get out.”

She startled, jerked when the water cut off. She stood blinking through the water dewing her lashes and stared at him.

“I said get out.”

Castle shoved the curtain back and grabbed her by the arm. She stumbled forward and came tripping out, barely caught herself on the towel bar. Castle glanced at her, nodded to himself, and handed her a towel.

“Dry off. Leave it in here.”

He turned and left her there, and she chewed on her bottom lip watching him go. 

Why was he always leaving?

Leaving her alone. 

She dropped the towel, still half-soaked and pink-flushed with the shower, and she stepped quietly through the bathroom to the door, searching for him.

Castle was crouched at the far end of the single room, hunched before a cold fireplace, and she saw him strike flint and tinder and coax flame to catch at the newspaper he’d stuffed below some logs. She hesitated - he had said to dry off but she hadn’t because he kept ditching her when it was just beginning to get good - and now he stood once more and dusted off his hands.

And while she stood there, indecisive (she should just tell him to forget; it wasn’t going to work, not with him in and out of the game), Castle gripped his crotch and kneaded himself.

She froze.

His head dropped back, a noise coming out of his throat, and she realized he was aroused. Seriously, thoroughly hard for her and they had barely started.

No wonder he kept walking away. He was trying to maintain control over himself.

She scuttled back into the bathroom fast, snatched up the towel, and hurriedly swiped it over her legs and chest. She dropped it back on the floor and turned to head out once more, stepping over the threshold with a little thrill in her chest.

Even if it was only a game, it was still sex with him. The way he’d curved his fingers along her ass, oh hell, she knew what that meant about the rest of the night. And she hadn’t taken him in her ass in so long that just the nervous anticipation was making her wet.

The penance might be only a game, but the sex between them was more. 

“Beckett,” he snapped without turning. She froze, then stepped forward again, came up at his back. “Don’t move.”

She halted mere inches from his body. Past him, the fire was catching now, the logs blackening and slowly being consumed. She swayed there, still flushed from the heat of the shower but here in his shadow the fire didn’t reach her and the air was still cool, like kisses.

Castle turned to face her and her eyes snapped immediately to the rope in his hands. Thick, hemp, corded. They had never done rope. He said rope chafed, would pull her skin off; he had always told her no.

He nodded to her arms and wordlessly she lifted her hands to him. He shook his head.

“Behind you.”

She swallowed and put her hands behind her back, closed her eyes when he moved around her. He was still fully clothed, while she was naked, her nipples peaked in the cooler air of the cabin. 

“You’re still dressed,” she husked.

“That better not be a hint.”

She huffed and closed her mouth, rolling her eyes at him even though he couldn’t see her. But before she had a chance to say anything else, he was gripping her by her wrists and yanking her back into his body.

Off-balanced by that, she swayed and bumped his shoulder, turned her head to look at him. He was making a wide loop at her elbows though and she was too bewildered by that to speak.

He made a noose, slipped over her hand and up, and now her elbows were each tied so that they were chained together rather than bound. She couldn’t move her arms forward this way, but her hands were free even if they were behind her back.

“Hush, baby, I know you don’t understand. But guess what? I don’t care. I know what I’m doing.”

She sighed, her breasts rising and falling with her breath, and now she could feel the warmth of the fire on her bare skin. Castle was looping the free end of the rope cross-wise over her arms, and while it didn’t bring them back any tighter, he was now binding her wrists together.

Her throat closed up.

Her hands were fists at her lower back, resting just above her ass, and her elbows pointed - impossibly - out.

It didn’t hurt, but it wasn’t entirely comfortable, and she shifted on her feet and rolled her shoulders back. Castle moved around her even as she tested the bounds of her bindings, but the rope bit into her wrists and she froze, that jackrabbit of panic in her throat.

Castle’s gaze traveled up her body and lingered on her breasts. She realized her chest was thrust forward this way, that her arms behind her back forced them into this position for good.

He reached out and cupped her breasts, gripping them roughly; her knees went weak. She groaned, head rolling forward, but he abraded her nipples with his thumbs and dug his fingers into her flesh, making her gasp. 

“Very good. Trussed up for me.” His mouth was a lazy smile when he finally met her eyes and his gaze burned into her. “Makes your breasts full, and heavy, when you’re so aroused like this.”

“Please,” she got out. “I want your mouth on me.”

“Does it look like I care what you want?”

She grit her teeth and glared at him, but he wasn’t looking at her face any more. He kneaded her breasts, lifting them and pushing them together, and then he released her rounded flesh and gripped her shoulders.

And shoved her down.

She stumbled, made weirdly off-balanced by having her arms behind her back, but when she moved to stabilize herself with a kind of lunge, Castle kicked her leg out from under her.

She cracked hard on the woven rug before the fireplace, leaning hard to one side, but he had a grip at the back of her neck and kept her steady. She was breathing hard when she looked up at him, found him looking down on her.

“Open your mouth.”

Her whole body dumped adrenaline through her blood just that fast. She didn’t know why flashbacks came at her so hard, but she reeled back and sank on her heels, trembling, panic clawing up her throat.

“Fucking open your mouth, Beckett. Right the fuck now.”

She keened, opening her eyes first, and saw him unbuckling his pants.

Something horrific slithered through her guts and came up high in her chest, burning, but even then, even then, she was swaying before him like a hypnotized snake, watching with drop-jawed anticipation as he unzipped his fly.

He pushed a hand into his boxers and took out his cock.

Her heart was thundering like mad, and now wetness trickled down her bare leg. Castle stepped up to where she had fallen back to sit on her heels, and he angled his cock towards her.

She opened her mouth wider and turned her head to meet him, but he stopped her. His hand came to her cheek and pushed her away, cupped the side of her face to hold her there, his fingers digging in under her jaw painfully.

She felt him rubbing his cock next to her face, felt him along her ear, disturbing her hair. She trembled as he stood akimbo over her, his feet planted firmly to either side of her thighs. She closed her mouth and swallowed roughly, felt herself canting into his cock.

Her cheek bumped him, the heat and throb of his massive erection, and he clutched her jaw, groaned from above her.

“Your breasts look so pretty, thrusting up for me. I’m going to come all over them.”

She lifted her chin to see if he really meant it, but Castle gave a growl and his cock surged, caressing her cheek with the pulse of his tension. She opened her mouth, dragging in a breath, and Castle took one half-step back.

And ejaculated all over her breasts and her neck, not even handling himself, not even playing with himself, just gripping her by the shoulder and letting go.

Her heart was pounding so hard she was rocking side to side with it. But Castle dragged two fingers through the mess at the top of her breasts and grinned.

She shivered. He was blocking the fire. He was looming over her as his cock twitched and went still.

“That’s much better,” he hummed. “Come here, sweetheart. I want to fuck your mouth until I’m hard again.”

\-----

Castle pressed himself deep and felt her struggling to swallow his cock.

It was infinitely erotic, his hands fisting her hair and her mouth molten around him. It was also too long to hold her down against him, and he let it go on for a heartbeat more before withdrawing his hips and guiding her back. 

Her lips glided, supple and swollen around his shaft and popped off. She took a ragged breath and dove back for him without his needing to prompt, and now it was nearly impossible to keep from thrusting his hips in time to her sucking.

Her cheeks hollowed and he felt the movement both at his wrists were he cradled her head and also around his fierce erection. The soft inner walls of her cheeks touching him in a faint echo of the way her walls contracted around him when he was buried inside of her.

She moaned and he swiveled his hips as he sank in, feeling the vibrations in his balls. Everything was on-the-edge painful, every slow and demanding thrust, every scrape of her teeth as she got sloppy.

He had no desire to suffocate her, no thought for breath play; he only wanted his cock inside her mouth for as long as he could endure it. Her saliva coating him and making it slick and easy and hot, her neck straining, her eyes closed in ecstasy and now again opened in rapture.

Her breasts hit his thighs with every rocking plunge of his cock into her mouth and it was beyond reason, it was nothing at all like what they’d done before and yet entirely familiar. 

He’d fucked her mouth before, but he’d never made love to it.

She whined and bobbed her head, butting against him with her forehead, and he knew she was entirely frustrated without the use of her hands. He could go for hours like this, slowly sinking his cock into that verdant mouth, changing his angle of penetration between her lips just enough to feel her teeth or hit the roof of her mouth or the back of her throat, hours because she couldn’t touch him, couldn’t finger him, bring him to wild eruption with just a mere roll of his sac.

He cradled her head with fistfuls of her hair and pumped his hips, groaning when she sank back to her heels and her teeth caught him. He came in closer, feet planted wide to give her a moment to be off her knees, but he kept up the slow roll of his hips and she swallowed against him as he intruded.

“Fuck,” he growled, his eyes lazy on her. “Your mouth, baby. So damn good like this. Wearing you out with it. So damn wet.”

She whimpered. 

Something about the sound of her, stuffed with his cock, the higher pitch that sang through his shaft and down into his balls made him stiffen and torque suddenly. She gagged on his inadvertent thrust, he gripped her face, and then his orgasm broke over him in a wave.

He jerked a few thrusts into her mouth as he came, felt her swallowing and sucking at him, felt her body leaning into his until he was holding her up.

She came off his cock with a gasp and cry, and he opened his eyes in time to see her throat working as she struggled to breathe through all she’d swallowed down. He grunted and had to resist the urge to drop to his knees with her, instead he wound her hair around his fist once more and tilted her head back.

“Swallow easier this way,” he gruffed, swiping a hand down his face and shaking his head like a dog. “Felt like you pulled that one out by the roots.” He shuddered and pulled her face against his thigh in a kind of embrace, gripping her tight before he let go. “With that out of the way, I won’t be distracted, sweetheart. All my focus is on you now.”

Her eyes slid open, eyelashes dragging against his upper thigh. When her head fell back to see him, he smirked down into her frustration-fogged eyes.

“That’s right, baby. I let you suck me off, let you have what you wanted in your mouth, but now you’re going to have to come.”

“Please,” she husked. “Please let me-”

“You won’t be asking for more when I’m through with you.” He twitched the hair back from her face. “Now stand up. I want to see you. All of you.”

\-----

He had pushed her back on her heels again so that she was sitting before the fire, her arms trussed behind her back, her breasts pushed towards the crackling fire. The heat on her skin was a wicked contrast to the cool at her back and slowly her sweat began to dry.

He had left her alone to think, to wonder. To anticipate.

Fear.

But the edge of fear came on her like a storm front, pushed forward and cleared out by the sharp electricity of her own arousal. She was soaked between her legs, her thighs sticky with it, and every breath strafed her nipples in the air.

It was insane how much she craved him right at this moment, bowed slightly forward and bound, waiting for his pleasure. There was no bed in the single room; she hadn’t seen a pallet or a helpful sleeping bag. This was it. This was all she got.

The way he had controlled her, fucking her mouth, gliding his cock in and out of her without hurry, without thought for her own condition. Fucking her at his leisure, the way he wanted to - she had never realized just how base and humiliating it could be to have no say in how he touched her, no choice in what came next with him.

She had been caged for three years and most of those later years restrained in some form or another, but this-

She wanted him. So badly. She ached everywhere. She wanted him to fuck her, growling in her ear all those nasty things she couldn’t admit to wanting in the daylight. Here in the darkness there was only the fire, and it was heated on one side and so damn cold on the other, and she didn’t know why it made her tremble and want to be torn apart by his cock, but she did.

She did. Gored. She wanted annihilation. She wanted to be taken over by him (because clearly when she was in control she fucked it all up and made it broken and terrible and grief-stricken and if he was the one having her, he had her, and no trauma had ever come from Rick Castle fucking her exactly as he wanted).

She swallowed roughly and closed her eyes to the firelight, felt it dance over her face, shadow and light.

He was driving her mad with waiting. Everything a power play, everything orchestrated to remind her that she had no agency here; she was truly getting what she’d asked for, what she deserved - to be used, entirely, wholly used.

She felt the shift in the room, her whole body aware in the way it had learned inside, and even though that sent a shiver down her spine, she opened her eyes.

Castle.

He’d come back from the bathroom in only his pants; he had removed his shirt at some point and she had missed it. Her crestfallen look must have communicated to him, because he lifted an eyebrow.

She flushed and ducked her head, blinking hard as the burn of tears started in her throat.

(Oh, God, if she cried now she would ruin it. He’d ruin it trying to get to her. She couldn’t cry, couldn’t. No.)

“I know you wanted to do it yourself,” he said, making his way to her. She saw his bare feet against the wood floor, the way his smallest toe turned out when he pushed off. “But it’s not up to you, is it? You don’t get to decide, sweetheart.”

His fingers touched the top of her head and she lifted her chin to see him. He stroked down the side of her cheek and rimmed her bottom lip. Her mouth opened seemingly without her say.

“I’ve got it all set up, baby. Exactly the way I need it. Took some work, had to be creative, you know.”

“Creative?” she husked. Where had he been, and doing what?

“This is a CIA safe house, love. If you think this one room is all there is, you’re not thinking at all.”

Oh, God. No.

“I - can’t,” she said, trembling now, her nipples peaked and hard, her mouth dry. “I can’t do those little spaces, I ca-can’t-”

He touched her lips with a finger, shook his head. “You don’t get to decide. I’ve wanted to do this to you for years.”

Her heart was thundering.

“String you up and fuck you as your feet barely touch the floor, the swing and sway of your body. I can fuck you however I like, from behind, before, drop to my knees and eat it all out of you, then fuck you all over again when you’re empty.”

She moaned, her eyes slamming shut at the image. The overhead exposed pipes inside the standard CIA panic room - she could picture it, exactly how he would stand behind her and untie her elbows only to lift her still-bound wrists over her head and loop it over the metal, string her up.

She had said once something about hanging up to dry, something about how she loved him pinning her hands over her head and drilling her with his cock, and he’d done it more than once on the bed, but oh God, oh God, strung up like a prisoner, no, God, no-

“You don’t get to say no.” He gripped the back of her neck and jerked her towards him. “You don’t get to decide. You forfeited your choice when you fucked someone else. And now I’m retaking every fucking inch of your body, every crevice, every stretch of skin and hard plane of bone. Any damn way I want to. And you’ll fucking love it.”

She blinked fast, the burn starting up behind her eyes again. She licked her lips and swallowed, tried to figure out what he wanted her to say.

He came down to one knee before her, leaned forward into his planted foot. His eyes glittered like blue flame. “But first, Kate, sweetheart, lie back on your shoulders and spread your legs for me. By the time I’m done with you, you’ll be begging me for the panic room.”

\-----

She was a hard arc, her hipbones lifted towards him. Her knees were on either side of his own, where he smoothed his palms up and down her thighs, watching her skin quiver.

Pushed on her back like this, balanced precariously on her bound arms and her shoulders, her whole body was an arrow to her cunt. The tight curls at her groin framed the dewed lips of her sex, milky white from either his own come or her arousal, hard to tell.

Everything pointed towards her cunt. To that gaping wound he ached to fill. 

Her head rolled to one side as she stared up at him.

He circled her belly button with a finger and she cried out, another crippled arch of her body.

“Baby, you might want to save your strength for when it’s really needed. All this writhing and I haven’t even gotten close.”

She rolled her head back, gasping for breath, and he literally was only touching her belly button.

She was working herself up without his even having to do anything.

“You’re so beautiful like this,” he sighed. Her skin rippled as if in reaction to his words. “Your cunt on display for me.”

She groaned, hips bucking in a limited way, and he had to admit something in him was seriously affected by having her at his mercy.

She couldn’t damn well stay, then he’d make her stay.

“Rick,” she husked. “Please.”

“Sweetheart, you don’t even know what you’re asking for.”

“Any-anything.”

“You’re gorgeous, you know. Your skin glows in the fire, and I love this-” He scratched lightly at the dip of her stomach where it had become concave, not eating enough. “The hollow places, I could do without, but I think I know how to fill you.”

“Please,” she whimpered.

“Oh, but first...” Castle leaned in and sucked lightly at her belly button, holding her in place with his hands. She groaned and squirmed, and he could smell her from here, smell her wanting him.

He nosed down into her pubic hair, closing his eyes to the way it felt against his cheek and chin, the familiar scratch and soft of those coarse curls. He ran his hands along the tops of her thighs and spread her legs a little wider, making her ass shift on her heels where her legs were still tucked under her.

Had to be uncomfortable, and he felt that irritating nudge of awareness that demanded he do something about it, but instead of the usual - straightening her legs in front of her and pulling her upright, off those shoulders - he leashed his concern as tightly as he’d bound her wrists, and he lowered his mouth to her cunt.

Kate cried out, lifting into his mouth, and he sucked deeply at her sex, tasting her.

She moaned, writhing, writhing, and he licked a stripe against her folds. Creamy and hot, wet for him, and yet she still was bucking against him like a wild thing. He pressed his thumbs to her inside thighs to hold her down, pressing hard enough to bruise, and she cried Rick and bucked viciously.

He put his teeth to her folds and nipped, tugging at them, and then he slid a hand inward to help, pulled her apart to bite her clit.

Kate screamed.

He grinned wolfishly against her cunt and tongued her slit, pushing shallowly inside. She was bucking hard now, violence meeting his own violence, and he scraped his teeth at her clit again.

Her voice broke on the next one, a cracked sound that made his cock rise sharply in response. He fucking wanted her. So damn badly he growled and took her clit between his teeth and ground down.

She came with a scream, body vibrating under his hands, her thighs clamping down hard at his ears.

\-----

Castle pulled her upright while she was still shaking and spasming inside (he was sure of it), and then he switched places and pushed her forward, hanging onto her by the rope between her wrists.

Kate groaned as she went, slumping to the floor prostrate, her bound arms slacking, her ass on display for him now. He slapped lightly at her ass and she shivered, another moan escaping her, and Castle kept one hand at her bound wrists, gripping tightly.

Her forehead was pressed to the floor, her body moving in hard gulps of air, and yet her fingers curled around his wrist and thumb and fingers, tangling and gripping him in return, holding onto him.

He leaned forward and kissed the raw skin above the rope, the place where she’d gotten the tattoo on her inside wrist. She whimpered and her fingers unfurled and stroked at his neck where she could reach. He licked her tattoo and bit faintly at her skin, pushing it against the rope until she moaned.

Now that he was hunched over her, he could feel the bare skin of his chest so electrically close to her ass, to the heat radiating off her from her weeping cunt.

He lifted up once more, keeping his firm grip on her bound wrists, her fingers tightening around his again. He used his free hand to skim the heart shape of her ass cheeks, pressed his fingers between them to feel the so-soft skin around her anus.

She was moaning now, squirming and pressing her forehead to the floor, and he teased the puckered ring of muscle that tried to deny him.

“Rick,” she gasped to the floor. She pushed off with her knees but he hauled her back with his grip on her bound wrists, kept her exactly there.

But he spanked her hard for that, making her groan.

“You trying to get away from me, Kate?”

“No, no, no-”

He spanked her again, reddening her flank, and she moaned, turning her head to see him. Her cheek pressed to the floor, her face flushed, her eyes were wild on him. He lifted an eyebrow and she turned her face back to the floor.

He coasted a hand down her flank where he had stung her flesh, watched the skin mottle and redden. Castle leaned down and bit her there, and she whimpered, her knees grinding into the floor but not trying it again.

He released her flank and licked inward to her ass, nipped lightly this time at the globe of her cheek. She grunted and pushed back into him, and he lightly spanked her for the movement - as if suggesting what came next.

Instead of tonguing her from behind, which they’d done before, he straightened up and began unzipping his pants.

Kate writhed. “Please, please-”

“Shut the fuck up. Or you get nothing.”

She fell silent, though he could hear her panting against the floor, and he reached in with his free hand and found his cock.

He was so fucking hard he could barely touch himself, and yet he did it anyway, fisting himself to keep his teeth on edge, to make it hurt.

If she was gonna hurt, then he would too.

Kate was moaning again, making noises against the floor, and Castle pushed his pants down a little to free his cock. His erection was fierce, brutal even, and he rose to his knees and palmed her ass, rubbing against her.

She mewled, raising up on her knees as well, her ass a deliberate and beautiful target.

He slapped her hard for that. She gasped and rocked with the blow, but he kept her steady with his grip on her wrists. “You keep making non-verbal suggestions, like demands, and you will sorely regret it.”

She whimpered.

“Do you understand me?”

“Y-yes,” she gasped.

“Very good, baby.” He scratched a blunt nail over the place he’d spanked and she moaned at the sensation against her raw skin. “Stay just like this, on your knees, your ass up for me.”

She whimpered again, her noises sounding senseless, and he reached around and found that soaked place between her legs.

Kate cried out and rocked into his hand, and he let her ride him for a while, slick and wet, until it was enough.

“No, no, come back-”

“That’s not where I’m aiming for,” he snapped, roughly tugging on her bound wrists. She grunted with pain as her shoulders jerked across the wood floor, but her ass bumped his groin, pinning his cock. “There are no toys here, Beckett. No lube. No helpful butt plugs to widen you up for me. There’s only your own wetness-” Here he smeared her arousal at her ass and played with her anus. “-and my thumb.” He invaded her with a push of his digit.

She moaned, contracting around just that much of him. He could feel her thighs trembling as she tried to keep herself from swaying. She groaned as he pushed deeper, and already she was spasming, fluttering with the beginnings of her orgasm. He worked his thumb around that ring of muscle, scraped at the sensitive place just against the front wall.

Kate was mewling into the floor.

He got a tighter grip on her wrists, tighter, (fuck, fuck, there was no lube, nothing to make sure he wouldn’t make her bleed, he might actually make her bleed), and then he guided his cock to her ass.

She screamed as he penetrated.

He grit his teeth, the feeling of her around his cock, the force with which he had to thrust to put himself there-

fuck

He had broken out into a furious sweat and his grip on her wrists was too tight but he couldn’t stop. Oh, fuck, he could not stop this now. 

His heart was thundering, his cock roaring for more of her body, more of this tight, hot, impenetrable sheath. She whined and writhed, and her movement alternately brought her closer and farther away from him.

He jerked once on her wrists and forced himself into her ass. She screamed again and spasmed around his cock, orgasming with such ferocious power that her legs collapsed and her voice strangled in her throat.

Castle had meant to withdraw once she was insensate, once he’d shoved her over the edge, but something had him paralyzed inside her. Something clutched him like a talon and his heart squeezed, his lungs seized, and he fucked her.

He scooped her up by her hips and brought her ass back into his groin and he fucked her.

He growled her name in both supplication and domination, and he fucked her hard in the ass until his own orgasm ripped from him with violence.

\-----

She came to thrown over his shoulder, blood rushing to her head and pounding in her temples. She groaned, sticky and sweat-soaked and aching badly, but he was hauling her away.

She faintly saw the shadows pass over her and realized with a sick dread that she was being carried into a narrow room.

“No,” she groaned, shifting.

He slapped her ass - hard - and she gasped, jerking inward only to have him spank her again, the sting of his palm burning clear to her cunt.

“You don’t get to protest, Beckett.”

She shivered as he swung her over onto her feet, but her knees wouldn’t hold and she sagged into his chest. He didn’t try to catch her, didn’t embrace her or brush his lips at her temple or cup the side of her face. He only gripped her by the throat and forced her to find her own balance lest she be strangled by his fingers.

A room, a panic room, very small, for the one in protective custody to hide while the CIA agents outside took fire. Steel walls, the roof overhead reinforced, two beams. From one dangled a chain with a pair of cuffs and her heart pulsed in her throat, cutting off all else.

Her eyes struggled to find his, but he moved around her, left her bereft of any kind of assurance. She was shivering now, all that heat had disappeared, and her body was bruised all over. She heard the knife come out of its sheath and keened, but he snagged her by the hair and shoved her forward.

The rope broke at her elbows, came apart at her wrists, and her body sagged, as if all of her strings had been cut with it. But instead of the relief and burn of her shoulders being set free, she was being jerked around to face him once more.

He tugged her arms forward and she cried out, stumbling with pain as her shoulders wrenched, out of socket and in again. Before she could process the agony that still had its teeth sunk in her, her arms were being pulled over her head and hooked into the handcuffs, her toes barely touching the floor, giving her no leverage. 

Like a carcass, bleeding out.

His come was leaking from her. She shivered as it curled down her knee, and for some reason, she lifted a leg and touched the back of his calf.

Castle turned to look at her, but nothing was on his face.

She shivered and pressed her face to her raised arm, twisted her wrists in the handcuffs. The skin was burned and scraped, and the cold metal seemed to freeze against the raw places.

He brought the rope now, the pieces left from where he’d cut her bindings, and he looped it around her waist like a noose. It tightened and she gasped, her toes scrabbling for purchase.

“Rick,” she pleaded, seeking his face, something of him, of the man she knew.

His fingers skimmed her ribs and tucked under the rope, tugged. She swayed and gasped, trying to find purchase, seeking a foothold where there was none, her shoulders aching fiercely.

He moved to her back and she groaned, skin rippling and tightening, and the burn between her legs was so intense she felt herself beginning to orgasm.

He touched his lips to her shoulder blade and lifted his hands to her breasts, cupped them, kneaded, pinched her nipples.

She cried out, legs knocked free of her perch by his body, and suddenly she climaxed, seized like a fist and shaken, and from between her legs the fluid gushed, an orgasm so intense she was wet everywhere, soaked, unable to breathe, sobbing.

\-----


	14. Chapter 14

Castle stroked the back of his fingers between her thighs, the cream of her orgasm, painted a line up to her ass.

“You plead, you whimper, and yet-” He placed an open-mouthed kiss at her neck and nipped the tendons where she hung there, wiped out by him. “And yet, sweetheart, you’ve never come so hard in your life.”

She mewled, the sound escaping her like air, and he cupped the side of her head and kissed the corner of her mouth.

“Do you know what this is, love?” She whined, her lashes fluttering on her cheek but unable to open her eyes. “Female ejaculation. An orgasm so hard your body gushes fluid from the ducts here.”

He stroked between her legs with two fingers, either side of her clit and circling her entrance. She barely twitched, so strung out and pushed past herself, outside of her own body for once.

“There are so many things you don’t know. So many ways I can play your body for pleasure, for pain, for sensation so extreme you won’t know which side it falls on.”

Kate mewled and kittened against his hand, her mouth opening and sucking at his finger.

“It’s my honor, and my duty, to explore how much you can take, and then to bring you just past that threshold, into territory you never thought possible.”

Her tongue curled around his finger. He slid his free hand between her legs and worked the fluid into her sex, humming his approval at her neck. Her hair was damp from sweat, the smell of sex filled the small room, and even though she normally was set into a panic attack at being in such enclosed spaces, she barely moved now.

“Do you know what it means to me, sweetheart, to make you gush for me?”

She moaned, beginning to rouse once more, and her teeth bit down on him, gnawing in a feral kind of way, like she had no control over it.

“How I’ve pushed you out past all control, fucking you so hard you don’t even know your own name, let alone have possession of your body.”

She whimpered and suckled from his finger. He withdrew it, making a wet trail down her neck and to her breasts.

“Remember when I could nurse from your breasts? That time I took you from behind in the shower and your nipples let down and sprayed the walls with milk, how damn erotic that was.”

“Oh, God,” she groaned. Her whole body vibrated in his hands and he skimmed down to her ass, spread her ass cheeks to encompass his groin. “Rick.” His name broke in a whimper in her throat and he rubbed himself there at her ass. “Rick, please. More.”

He growled and bit the soft place at her shoulder where it was raised, slid his hands down her flanks to spread her legs. “Been too long since I was inside you.” He pushed his fingers into her folds and smelled again the release of her fluid in the air, and then he pressed up inside her body.

Kate mewled and swung from her arms, dangling there, and he fit his growing, hardening erection into the slot made by her body.

“Love me,” she moaned. “You love me, please love me-”

“No, honey, this isn’t the place or time.” His heart flipped over but he steadied himself. “I’m going to fuck you. Roughly. Where it already hurts because of me. Where you’re already raw and split open. Replace my fingers with my cock and pound inside you until you can’t even come any longer.”

Kate whimpered and her head fell back, laying on his shoulder, her throat working as she swallowed. He was entirely certain she was dehydrated and without enough spit to swallow, and his cock pulsed hotly at her ass.

Castle reached between her legs and found himself, pressed with his fingers into her folds until he found her slit, pushed forward.

She cried out, shuddering so hard she rattled the handcuffs against the steel beam. He began fucking her, shallowly, watching her lashes and her throat, the vulnerable places, the way her whole body hung there and took it.

He fucked her slowly at first, enjoying himself, sinking deep, so deep inside his own darkness that it became the only thing left to him. Having her. Possessing her, this exquisite and dark creature who tried so hard to deny him. To run from him.

To hide.

She couldn’t hide now. She was entirely exposed to him, entirely opened up. He fucked her and touched every line and curve of her body, devouring her with his cock, his eyes, his hands.

“Feel me,” he growled. “How fucking powerless you are to resist. Your softness in all the right places, the angles of your bones can’t keep me out.”

She moaned, throat working, inside muscles fluttering.

“You can’t do a damn thing to stop me. I’m going to fuck you all night, all damn morning, until every time I penetrate you, you’ll gush for me because you just can’t control yourself-”

She cried out and orgasmed against his thrust, and once more, that fluid coursed out of her, coating his cock this time and his thighs, her thighs, his finger where he’d been touching her.

“That’s it, sweetheart. Just like that.” She was still shaking, sobbing his name, and he realized her body still hadn’t come down from that high, that intensity. He pumped his hips and she began begging, nonsense words, low and desperate, and he released her breasts and cunt to grip her hips instead.

Then he really began to fuck her. Hard. Pounding deep so that his balls hit her ass and his body was a rigid line of ferocity. She cried and sobbed and gasped for him, hanging limp and pliant and entirely under his control.

She came a second time, her body curling upward towards the steel beam, knees rising as if to escape him, her desperation lending her strength.

Castle spanked her ass for disobeying and she screamed.

It set him off, that sound, her abuse, him the abuser, and he ejaculated hard inside her body, flaring up brilliant and difficult and intense.

\-----

She was fucked.

She couldn’t bring her awareness around to focus, but she was fucked. He would come, she was certain he had come, but then he was setting her off again and she was orgasming so hard her shoulders were wrenched out of socket. And then he was lifting her by her hips upward and her shoulders went back into place.

He wrapped her legs around his waist and she clung automatically, and then he fucked her again, fucking her slowly, keeping himself deep inside her as his mouth and hands were greedy for her flesh. Her head fell back and her eyes opened to the steel beams of the ceiling, her body being stretched.

He fucked her continuously. She lost track of time or orgasms, came in a flush of heat or a rage of contractions only to be fucked again, still, never ending.

She was outside of herself. All body and sensations, pain and agony, wetness and burn. Starbursts behind her eyes, whited out. His cock pushing through her, all rough rugged agony, and she was fucked.

He came again but it didn’t seem to matter. He was still fucking her. He was moving her body where he wanted it, her body swinging, hanging for him, and he fucked her without pause, without ceasing.

Her legs were dropped. Her body cascading pain and intensity. He arranged her with one leg over his shoulder and she screamed, coming back to herself with fresh and sharp awareness.

She came with a blinding intensity, screamed again but her throat didn’t work. Broken. All broken.

She was fucked.

\-----

She lasted about three hours.

When her eyes no longer stayed open, when her orgasms no longer contracted through her body but simply fluttered and went still again, when his own body struggled to rise again, he finally stopped.

He was sweating profusely, dehydrated himself, and he was shaking head to toe as if he’d run the gauntlet in some undercover mission. He bowed his head to her shoulder and closed his eyes, wrapping his arms around her body.

She didn’t even twitch.

He lifted her by her hips and her arms went slack. He managed to get his arm under her ass and hang onto her, though he was alarmed by how much he was shaking, how much it had taken out of him. 

How weak he was now.

He fumbled at the handcuffs, but he couldn’t get his fingers to work the trick release. He had to lower her back down and move for the key, and when her shoulders took the weight of her body again, Kate whimpered and her head rolled on her neck.

But she didn’t come back to him.

He snagged the key from the pegboard beside the army locker, and then he came back to her, hooked his arm under her ass and lifted her up. When he tried to jab the key into the lock, her body swayed and he had no leverage, and now he was beginning to sweat for real, shaking and weak.

Fuck. Not how this was supposed to go. Damn it.

He gritted his teeth and set himself, and he jabbed the key in the lock once more and finally it fit, clicked and turned open. Her arms dropped immediately, one wrist still clanking with the cuffs, and he shifted her against him.

She was entirely out.

Castle gripped the back of her neck and carried her out of the panic room, towards the main room and the fire burning. The moment his body heat left the panic room, it closed up automatically, shutting behind them.

He’d left blankets and bedding before the fire, so they’d be warm for her. When he knelt down, Kate still in his arms, he had to spread open the blankets one handed, being careful to keep her head on his shoulder.

She didn’t rouse even when he lowered her to the bedding, a doubled up old sleeping bag. He moved his arm out from behind her neck and pulled one of the thin sheets over her body, wanting her to feel every ache, every sticky place, every inch of herself stretched too far when she finally came around again.

More than that, he wanted very badly to curl himself around her and shield her from - from himself.

But he couldn’t do that.

He would wake her in a few hours and take her once more in the ass, so that it would last this time, so that she would have no doubt.

He needed a shower.

No.

No, he needed to press his body to hers and hold her because he wanted to, because he needed it, and damn everything.

Castle crawled into the bedding behind her and smelled himself all over her skin, in deep, so damn deep. He opened his mouth at her shoulder and sank his teeth into her skin and she didn’t so much as twitch.

Before he really knew what he was doing, he slipped his hand between her legs and plugged her with three fingers.

And then he dozed, letting his body rebuild.

\-----

She woke with a scream, found herself being fucked.

At first she had no orientation, no ability to discern, and then she realized he was deep inside her ass and rocking his hips, groaning against her neck. Something that should have been panic flickered with her breath but it died out just as fast, and now all she felt was his cock, the intense pressure of his cock back there.

And his fingers. Inside her cunt, hooked. Hooking at her cunt and pumping so that she felt the girth of his cock pressing up against the wall of her sex where his fingers were.

He was fucking her still.

She moaned and moved back into him, into his thrust and his body’s insistence. Her hands were free. She was mostly on her stomach but her hands were free and she fumbled in to where his hand was and their fingers tangled.

His moans were hot against her neck. His cock and fingers worked in tandem and she tried her best to make her body comply. He was fucking her deep, shallow thrusts that barely withdrew, and his fingers stroked inside her.

She was panting, breathless already, her body sinuous and moving in time with his. He cursed and kissed behind her ear, bit down at the bone that protruded. Her sweat was running, pooling at her knees, slick. His cock was wet and thick, and pulsing, and she sobbed his name.

His palm ground into her clit and she screamed, coming apart without warning, shaking in his arms. He roared through the contractions of her body and she felt him trying to hold on to himself, hang on, but he couldn’t.

He climaxed inside her ass and she gasped, eyes wide at the frothing through her backside. 

Fullness. How he had filled her, all night, and now she was overfull and flowing, flooded.

“Oh, God,” she gasped.

He groaned and slumped on top of her, weighing her down until she almost couldn’t breathe, and yet he didn’t move.

She slowly fell unconscious, unable to hang on either.

\-----

Castle woke whole.

Every part of him that had been somewhere broken, unfinished, raw had knit together during the early hours of the morning while he'd slept. His body was sound, of course, would always be able to find that equilibrium, but his soul was as well.

A deep contentment filled him that he had never known before, and he realized with a kind of reluctant surrender that it was due to Kate.

To possessing Kate. Completely.

He had craved that possession in some corner of his soul and now the beast was glutted and he could rest.

And since he was being honest, it wasn't just a beast of his own making; she'd pressed her own unconscious feelings into him deep enough, far enough, that the beast had been petted and fed at her hand, made to feel both tamed and chained for her. Last night had been long overdue, but it had needed something extreme and last resort to push him there, to the place they had both needed to go.

Parts of him ached. In good ways, like muscles he hadn't known he had, used now and feeling it. Not his body, but his soul, and he had never quite made the distinction until now how separate those two things had been for him until her. Until her and his body was his soul, his soul was his body and his heart and his consciousness and his unconsciousness. His conscience. His soul existed, and his awareness of its existence was due to her, this woman passed out in his arms.

Castle extricated himself from their tangle of limbs, easing his weight off her, and heaped the covers over her instead. The fire had died down to bare embers, and he rose naked and stoked it, scanning the room for what he might have done with his pants. He couldn't even remember.

He felt the heat on his groin and the stirring of awareness without real life; his cock was as done as the rest of him, and that had never happened before. Well, once, that time at Halloween a few years back after they'd taken the boys trick or treating and then straight to bed, all exhausted and happy and giggling and curling up with each other like wolf pups, and then he and Kate had found all those dark places in them during the witching hour.

After that night of experimenting, his cock had been sated. Not at this level maybe, but he should have realized, should have known. That had been the first time he'd taken her in the ass, her legs drawn up to her chest and her feet on his shoulders at the end of the bed, and damn not even thinking about it, reliving it, was stirring anything at all to life in him.

Good.

She would see that too. And know.

If she woke in time to know, really. Hell, if he was this played out, she was five times worse (five times more sated, at peace, content, he fervently hoped). The flame caught the new logs and finally flared to life before him and he closed his eyes and drank in the firelight like tonic, like elixir.

His ears had been cold. He hadn't realized. He really was sapped of strength, like Samson with shorn locks, Clark Kent before kryptonite, and now that he was here, and still, he was realizing the extent to which his super body had been gutted out by all of this.

Plus his mission, upon which arriving home he'd found her missing and the boys tearful and faintly anxious, that low buzz of not having her as a touchstone, of Kate shutting them out. Her shut downs happened often enough that it didn't leave them in screaming fits, not having her, but it was a warning sign of far more dangerous things. Shut downs always preceded a runner, and runners meant physical damage that often included hospital time away from them.

The boys had known, and Castle had immediately gone looking for her, and he hadn't been given rest in all that time.

As the light and heat licked his skin, his wakefulness turned drowsy, turned back in on himself, and he turned and crawled towards the bedding, and his woman, his, the claim entirely and purposefully made for always.

He tucked his body in around hers, brought her head to his bicep for a pillow, slid his leg between her thighs to support her hips, and held her against him. He wouldn't sleep now so much as doze, and he'd be awake the moment she woke.

He would see if last night had done for her what it had for him, and if it had, there was no way they weren't revisiting this scene in the future, when it was warranted, when she was out of her mind in the darkness and seeking annihilation. 

He could be her nothing.

\-----

She came awake in full sunlight lying flat on her back, legs tangled in sheets and one arm thrown above her head with the other flung towards him. 

Oh, on him, her knuckles grazing his ribs.

She ached. All over.

She closed her eyes and swallowed thickly, her thighs aching, her insides tender in a way that surprised her.

"Wake up."

She grunted and opened her eyes again, saw him looking at her. He grinned that wolfish smile and this time, for the first time ever, she saw exactly what he was capable of and how far he'd go to get it.

She shivered, dragged her knuckles to his neck. He turned on one shoulder towards her and bit her finger, grinning, and slid an arm around her waist to haul her into him.

mine

She wasn't sure if he had spoken it aloud but it was voiced inside her for sure, as certain as her own heartbeat in her head and her own pulse between her legs. Certain. She squirmed, but she was incapable of movement away, so exhausted and sore that shifting at all made her brace herself.

"Hot tub, if you're awake enough not to drown. Come on, love." He gathered her up against his chest and lifted upright and she groaned, sinking against him as it struck her again. "Come on. I used you well, and we both know it, but you won't be able to walk unless you soak for a while."

"Can't walk now," she groaned.

"I'll carry you." And he did, lifting her straight up and off her feet, rising to his full height so that she was breathless, clutching at him where she could. 

mine

It soaked down into swollen tissue and abused muscle, permeated all the places sluggish with pain, penetrated the ache until her cheek rested against his neck and her breathing matched his.

"You have to stay awake in here," he told her quietly. The door opened and she gasped, jerking inward as the cold blasted against her body from the back deck.

"Holy fuck," she gasped, pressing closer to him, winding her arm around his neck to hang on. "Shit. Castle."

"Hot tub. I already started it. Nice and frothy for us. Come on. Five steps of cold and now look, here-"

"Ah, shit," she groaned, eyes closing as her body was slowly submersed. "God. That feels so good."

"See?" he murmured, lips at her temple. "I know how to take care of you, don't I?"

"Hell," she groaned, eyes flickering open. She stared up at his face, that self-satisfied mine grin and the predator in his eyes still unchained. Still. "You do. You know. You are entirely-"

"Everything," he growled.

She sank into him, the water eddying around her, bubbling with the jets, the heat sinking into that tender place between her legs.

He knew. She had been so wrong, so very badly wrong.

Mine.

\-----

She played with his fingers to keep herself awake, leaning back against his broad chest while the water kept her buoyed and floating. He had to occasionally loop his arm around her hips and nudge her back down against him to keep her from drifting - the hot tub was spacious enough for six more - but even that was good. Claiming.

Mine

She heard it now with almost every gurgle of the water and whistle of wind past the cabin, with the slow thump of her heart pushing blood through her body, and with the echo of his even slower rhythm beneath her ear.

Her hair was soaked to the scalp as they rode low in the tub, her chin touched the water. She traced designs against the back of his hand, letters in his palm, and he rubbed his cheek to the top of her head so that his scruff caught her hair, doing it purposefully so he could comb it back down.

She liked it.

She didn’t know why she always resisted him so hard when this was so much easier. To float and let the heat soak into the places that ached so badly, let the mad bubble of water become a white noise that blanked out all other thought.

He gripped her by the thigh and let her play, and the heaviness of his arm, for the most, kept her down.

She didn’t need to know what came next, what was after this, who they rode out against, what mission parameters had she missed. She needed only the ache between her legs and the heavy thickness that rested like lead in her guts and the heat. Him or the water, either one, didn’t matter so long as he was there in it somehow.

He brushed his fingertips over the tops of her thighs and she realized he was counting her bruises.

She curled into him and listened for the hum of his breath as he added another, unbothered, his hand trailing down her spine now and pressing at those places where it was most tender.

“Ow,” she murmured, shifting against him.

He pressed again and kept going, down to her ass, and when his fingers touched there between her cheeks, she mewled, a bruising pain flaring to life.

“Mm,” he hummed. His body shifted, he cupped her ass and angled her away from the jets and she let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. “Better?”

“Yeah,” she croaked. Remembering, vividly, how he’d taken her without preparation, without warning. How he’d woken her with it later. 

A faint trickle of ice in her guts made her shift again on his lap, wondering, worried, but his cock didn’t so much as twitch.

He combed his fingers through her hair and laid his lips to her eyebrow. “Can’t even if I wanted to,” he murmured. “Aroused as I am right now, cataloging every fresh evidence of how much you’re mine, it’s not happening. I don’t have the electrolytes, the fluids, or the stamina for it. For at least another, oh, probably four hours, the way this is going. Maybe more. It’s guesswork.”

She reached between them and cautiously touched his cock. Flaccid just couldn’t describe him ever; it seemed impossible. But even not erect, his cock had a gravitas and energy to it that made sharp awareness prick at her.

“Guesswork?”

“Never happened to me before, sweetheart.”

“Never... never?” She lifted her head, her hand still cupping him, to look him in the eyes.

He shifted so that his legs spread wider, as if inviting her perusal, and he gave her a rueful look. “Who exactly would I want to do this to other than you? And fuck, Kate, who the fuck would I trust enough to do it with?”

With.

It mattered, somehow, the preposition change. To to with. He had done it to her, but he’d done it with her.

“Trust,” she sighed, leaning her head against his shoulder once more. “No one. You could never trust they wouldn’t somehow... use it against you. It’s not - a nice thing, is it, Rick? Most people don’t want this so badly.”

“Fuck most people.”

So, no. Most people didn’t feel so craven, so alone in the darkness. Most people didn’t leave their five year old boys so that they could be fucked up against a brick wall in an alley because of that darkness, seek it out just to drown in it.

“Most people don’t know the beginning of what you and I know,” he husked. His fingers came to her ear and trailed. “Most people can’t feel what I feel with you, what we feel inside each other’s heads, what gets translated and transmitted from one subconscious to the next.”

Oh.

“And when I took you last night, you can’t tell me you didn’t feel - I don’t have the words for it yet - but how other it was, how it was like ripping out of your own skin into something fresh and clean and new. Scalded clean.”

“Yes,” she rasped, closing her eyes and leaning against his neck. “Please.”

“You know I know,” he husked. His voice was dark against her cheekbone. “You know I felt it. From you, with you. Did you not feel me?”

She had no idea what she felt except - except necessary. “Yes?” she whispered. Shivered. “Yes. Still do. Mi-”

“Mine.”

She nodded, looping her arm around him even though her insides felt like jelly and her thighs were so bruised they hurt just to move in the water. She drew closer and held his cock with her other hand, her thumb hitting all the usual places and he just didn’t rise for her.

“That is-” he grunted, gripped her by the back of her neck. “Actual torture. I can’t-”

She stopped, and he sucked in a ragged and choppy breath, his forehead crashing into hers. 

“Fu-uck.” He was shaking, the water trembling in ripples around him. “Can’t get hard but fuck does everything in my body scream for it.”

“I won’t,” she promised. Too much. He wasn’t the one who needed the pain like she needed it. He was the enforcer and she was the enforced. She had caused him more pain than a lifetime of torture sessions and his pain wasn’t what she liked.

“Thank you,” he husked. “You’d think if I can dish it out, I should be able to take it-”

“That’s not how this works,” she whispered, touching his lips with her fingers. She leaned back only far enough to catch his eyes. “You take it all the time. Here.” Her touch trailed down to his heart, resting there. “While mine is too battered to feel it much.”

“That’s not true,” he said, his eyes boring into hers. He framed her face with his hands and shook his head before he kissed her.

She hadn’t been kissed in so long that it was like an unfolding, flooding through her in a rich blend of taste and sensation, her groan pulled up from the depths.

He released her only marginally, his thumbs stroking her cheekbones as her eyes struggled to open.

He was limned with early morning light, the kind with frost in it so that everything was touched with blue and grey, clear and sharp. Her winter king.

“I love you,” she husked. “Not too battered for that. I love you, Rick.”

\-----


	15. Chapter 15

He combed the hair down her shoulder and twisted it up into his fist to keep it from tangling again. The jets had stopped a few minutes ago and though he knew she was hurting, she still laid with her cheek against the top of his shoulder, one arm tangled around his to keep her from being too buoyed.

“We should talk,” he tried, hesitating over the sentence.

She sighed, but her knees came up a little tighter, her body bumping against his. After she’d made certain he was as fucked out as she was, she’d stopped testing him, had simply floated with him in the hot tub, resting against him.

But they had no food, no bed. “We need to go. The safe house isn’t scheduled for use, but-”

“Yeah,” she sighed. “And I’m starving.”

He winced. “Shit.” His stomach growled and she giggled, lifting her head to touch a kiss to his neck. “Huh, guess I’m hungry too.”

She pushed back from his chest and struggled as she sat up, her knees drawn into his lap, her eyes heavy with exhaustion. Or satiation. It was hard to tell. “Famished,” she murmured. “Though you don’t look half as tired as I feel.”

“I slept. Hard.”

“Good.” Her eyes searched his face for a moment. “Should... we talk about other things?”

His lips quirked. “You volunteering?”

“No.” Her nose wrinkled and her chin dipped, her hair brushing his cheek as she leaned back into him. “No, I... I’m gong to ruin things if I-”

“No, honey,” he murmured, catching the back of her head carefully. She had bruises here too where he’d gripped her neck so hard. “You’re mine.”

“Words just make it all - messy and complicated. I don’t want to analyze this to death. It felt good, didn’t it? Didn’t-”

“You know it did.” He pressed his lips hard to her cheekbone to keep her silent. She subsided, laid her head against his shoulder once more. He gathered up a fistful of her hair, all over again, and this time she didn’t try to move.

Her legs were tightly closed, but her body wasn’t defensive in his lap.

“Kate. It felt good. It was good - is good. We’ll do this any and every time it’s necessary for one of us, when it does start getting complicated and messy, sweetheart. That’s when this happens. A cabin in the woods if we have the time to plan, but the panic room inside the fortress if it’s an emergency.”

Her palm pressed flat to his chest, but her fingers curled and stroked at his collarbone. He’d have called it nervous last week, and he’d have been right. But this morning, after last night, no. Nerves, anxiety, obsession - those things had been fucked out of her. This was touching to touch, touching to center her own thoughts and maybe find words.

“An emergency,” she murmured. “Like - like this.”

“Exactly that.” He twisted her hair a little tighter but brushed his lips against the corner of her eye where he could reach. “You’re no longer allowed to run, Kate. I’m making you stay.”

She sucked in a breath. Her hand went still.

“You got it fucked up in your head that you’re unnecessary. Maybe it’s my fault, telling you I wouldn’t hold you to me, trying to be the opposite of everything my father was. I can see how I’ve twisted it up for you, saying one thing, doing another, believing a third. Because the truth is, Kate, I’m permanently tied to you, bound up with you in ways no other human being could understand except maybe Colin, and our sons, and you leaving me feels like ripping my guts out of my body and watching my heart bleed somewhere outside of my chest.”

“No,” she gasped.

“Yes.” He tightened his fist at the back of her head, swallowed roughly. “You’re not allowed to leave. I will cage you when you look like you’re gonna run, when you - if you can come to me, that would be better for you, for me too - but if you can’t come to me, I will damn well lock you down and make you come.”

She shivered, her knees pressing hard into his ribs. “I - know.”

“I know you know, love. After last night, I’ve made my statement loud and clear, and you are mine, you will always be mine, you are in no way allowed to be any different.”

He could feel her heart pounding too fast in her whole body, shaking in the water. He wrapped his free arm around her shoulders and released her hair, lifted her chin to touch his lips to hers.

She mewled into his kiss, goose bumps breaking out on her skin and rubbing against his. She clung to him by his ears, her every breath more broken noise than anything else, and he let her face that inexorable hard wall of his own iron will, alone, for a moment longer.

And then he carefully pushed a hand between her knees and spread her legs over his lap as she stiffened with pain and clutched him so fiercely she drew blood in his ear and neck. He slotted her body right against his, pressing her to his abdominals, and he then wrapped his arms tightly around her hips and kept her against him.

She was shivering now with what might have been aftershocks, might also have been a push off the edge into true shock.

He was betting on her pleasure in this one.

“Do you know what I’ve discovered within myself, sweetheart? Last night, doing exactly as I wanted, putting your body in the places I wanted it, fucking you as I wanted to fuck you, for as long as I could stand it, until my balls erupted with climax after climax, do you know what dark beauty looked back at me?”

“What?” she husked, her knees so tight at his hips that his pelvis was cracking. She was shaking still.

“You.”

“What?”

“You looked back at me. With me, every single fucking second of last night, even when you were so damn outside yourself you were incoherent and passed out, my beautiful wild girl, you gave and gave and gave.”

She was trembling, but she lurched into him, made awkward by the waves of the water, made unsteady by something else. Her own fierce nature, her own desire. Maybe just relief.

“Sweetheart,” he husked, petting her hair and purposefully touching each bruise down her spine. “I took. But you gave. I needed you under it as much as you needed me to be over it, and while I had you, now that I’ve had you, there is no going back.”

“Don’t go back,” she begged. Clutched his neck, his ear, dragging her mouth to his. “I want you here. No, I - I don’t want you to be-” She shook her head and closed her eyes tightly, growled. “I want you here. I can - I feel like - oh God - like I finally did it all exactly right.”

“You did.”

She broke into tears, sobbing against his neck as she clung to him.

“Stop,” he commanded, and then sank deeper into the water until her face was wet. She gasped and choked on water, propelled herself upright to jerk free. He kept her within the circle of his arms but she was spluttering and swiping at her nose and mouth with the back of her hand.

Her eyes were wet but the tears were gone.

“You are not allowed to cry over what we did last night.”

She swallowed, staring at him.

“You do everything exactly right with me, Kate. And now that you know how that feels, now that you have that feeling finally inside you, hold on. God damn it, Kate Beckett, you better fucking hold on to that feeling because that is what is true.”

She nodded, silent, eyes wide, clutching his arms with her nails digging into him.

“I know how you felt it last night, I know what that felt like for you because it resounded in me. So it will do you no damn good to deny it later. I’m warning you, love. You start talking crazy again, panicked and irrational, I will fuck you within an inch of your life. And if you think that’s reward and not threat, then you weren’t fucking paying attention-”

“I know what it is,” she scraped out. Her mouth closed, her regard steady, brilliant, like a dark flame. 

“I know what it is as well.” He leaned in and bit her bottom lip, sucked hard to bring up the blood. “And now that I have a taste, my appetite is ravenous, and ready a moment’s word out of joint.” He released her lip from his teeth and breathed hotly against her open mouth. “Do you understand?”

“Yes,” she whispered.

“Good girl.” He slowly stroked the backs of his hands along the inside of her thighs and she mewled but crowded closer, pushing into him. He settled his hands on her hips and instead of starting shit he had no ability to follow through, he lifted her straight up and stood himself.

“Your arms are shaking,” she whispered, wrapping her body around his. “Your whole body is shaking.”

“I have very little left in me,” he husked, embracing her even as her legs painfully, crookedly settled into place around his hips. “I need a damn hamburger.”

“Find me clothes, Rick Castle, and we’ll go out for burgers.”

“Can you sit that long?”

“No,” she gave up, honesty bald in her voice. “But I will.”

“Have I said I’m in love with you?”

She buried her face in his neck and he knew. He simply walked them up the shallow steps and over the side, dripping super heated water onto the deck as he made his way back inside for clothes.

\-----

She wore his boxer briefs, loose as they were, because her panties hurt. She'd never experienced that before and she'd given birth. He hadn't given her a second's doubt over it either; he had only shook his head when she'd attempted it and yanked the panties back down her legs, handed her his own.

They were loose in her jeans, and loose was good (her jeans weren't supposed to be loose but they bagged on her, the boot cut flare looking almost clownish because of how much weight she'd lost the last few weeks). Loose meant not much touched, it didn't rub those raw places.

She had thought, a few short hours ago, she was just that fucked up in the head. But Castle was - well, what was he? Was he fucked up in the head too? Were they both damaged psyches trying to manage the best they knew? 

Most likely it was something along those lines, but God forgive her, she couldn't paint Rick in that light. He was light - to her. To her. And as she sat in their familiar Subaru with its tires whooshing through the rain-slick leaves on the highway, she was rational enough to recognize how skewed her perspective was, how everyone's perspectives were skewed by their own biases and prejudices and ways of ordering the world.

Therapy with him hadn't been for nothing. She knew the basics, and her online abnormal psych class had filled in the terminology and concepts for her so that she understood how the pieces fit together and what messages she still had circling in her head.

Amazing how much the agony between her legs gave her thoughts a single purpose, a track to ride. Fucking hell, she was sensitive everywhere. There was a spot on her inside thigh that she thought had come from his zipper, and she'd been spotting a little when she'd gone to the bathroom before they'd left. And this man sitting beside her, driving elegantly through the rain, lazily almost, his stomach growling in time to hers, he had done this.

He was light to her. He wasn't to everyone else, to the whole rest of the world, otherwise he'd be a god. And he was no god. He was, though, her salvation, and no one man, no human being, should be anyone else's salvation. They had worked on that for years now, having agency and Castle simultaneously. But the issue now was not agency - and it wasn't that he was her salvation.

She needed to be forced. 

She had to be made.

She had messages in her head that fit into a certain schema that was wrong, invalid, and yet she kept falling back on that structure no matter how they dismantled it. To keep her from those self-sabotaging ways, she had to be made to exist within the right structure, the correct schema, the truth of things.

And he made her. He was the only who could make her.

Kate sighed, tilted her head back in the seat, wincing over a pothole.

With pain came such clarity.

He was light to her and she'd been so certain she was darkness to the whole of him, that she'd panicked and done a runner, very badly this time, blowing it all to pieces. But she couldn't ruin what wasn't true in the first place. He wasn't light itself; he was only that to her. To the boys, probably to Colin as well. He was light to his family, the epitome of goodness, but she knew the boys found that in her as well, despite herself, because of herself even, and that was a good feeling too.

How clear it all was when she wasn't caught in the cage of her own panic attack, her own damn irrational darkness cultivated and nurtured by John Black. How clear it all was when she was fucked out past her own endurance so that all that remained was the cage Castle made for her, the thing so beautiful she couldn't usually bear to look at it. 

Castle had told her to hang on to this, and she would, oh God, she would burn this into her body as surely as the ache that thrummed with every heartbeat.

"You're thinking a lot over there for someone who was fucked so good last night."

She laughed, listing towards him, too far away in the driver's seat. "Mm. Might be the only time I think without-" She shrugged, found his hand as it came over the center console to search for hers. His grip was crushing her knuckles, like he just didn't know when or how to stop it, how to turn it off now that it was most assuredly on.

Maybe she didn't want it turned off.

"Without?"

"Without me getting in the way. No, that's not right. You fucked me so good that now I am the only thing left."

"Oh," he husked, and brought her hand up against his chest. She could feel the tattoo of his heart and suddenly she knew.

"I want us to get tattoos," she said quickly. "Smart. Safely. But the same mark-"

"Yes."

She let out a fast breath and leaned her cheek to his shoulder despite the way it stretched her aching body across the center console. "Yes," she murmured. "Instead of - rings."

His thumb stroked in along her palm and to the base of her ring finger. "Not here. As a spy, I can't-"

"I know," she said simply. "But I have the symbol for the boys at my hip in reminder, and you and I-"

"Infinity," he said. "That's what I want. The infinity symbol, Kate."

She pressed her lips together, felt the way he wasn't asking. He wasn't asking at all, and he hadn't been asking last night, and this was a subtle but new dynamic for them.

"Matching," she said, because she wasn't asking either. They were two wills, meshing together. "Discrete location, of course, sweetheart. But the same."

His thumb swirled around her thumb and she heard his faint hum that echoed in his throat before he spoke. "I do."

She pressed her face into his shoulder because he knew - so much - he was light to her - and she was his.

More completely now, in this moment and for always, than if he'd agreed to marry her two days ago.

\-----  
Castle stayed on the highway rather than get back on the interstate, searching for smaller towns that would have everything they needed. He knew tongues would wag about the condition they’d be found in, but in a more limited way in a town off the beaten path, not on the interstate’s narrow corridor.

He stopped in Mercy, New York, because it felt right.

She had evidently not seen the town’s welcome sign because her face was placid as they drove down Main, though she nodded to the Dollar General and he took direction like they always did it. He parked behind the discount store in a parking lot belonging to an Italian fast food place, and they got out, Kate carefully and with much pause, while he came around the front of their Subaru and waited on her.

“You thinking clothes?” he said, frowning at the dollar store.

“Mm, toothpaste and stuff. Clothes somewhere better, Rick.”

“Good.” He approved of that. They needed luggage if they were going to take their time getting home. He should call Colin and talk to the boys since last night he hadn’t, but it wasn’t high on his priority list right now.

She was about one through twenty on his list, and getting her properly clothed and fed took precedence. She needed to not look like she’d spent a night in an alley - fucked or otherwise - and his own clothes had been hastily changed into at the Office when he’d landed on US soil.

In other words, not his clothes, and those weren’t hers, and he was going to get her something that was her own. Clothes she’d even keep after today. Not threads destined to be burned.

She was shading her eyes with a hand, peering towards the dollar store as if calculating in her head how much to spend and where to allocate mission expenses.

“Food first,” he told her, stepping towards the Italian place. “Beckett. With me.”

She snapped to attention, her hand dropping its shade, but he didn’t wait to make eye contact, simply turned for the restaurant. She followed, as she damn well better have followed, and he reached back to take her by the hand.

Their fingers laced. He knew she was struggling to walk without appearing odd, that she was obeying his rule about public places, but he said nothing to release her from it. She would have pain for another few days, and extreme tenderness for weeks, and he knew what that meant for their physical relationship.

She was off sex for a few weeks, just until muscles healed and flesh resumed its shape. Until she wasn’t bleeding every time she went to the bathroom, and he knew that much.

He’d had zero intentions of sparing her this pain, but now that it was upon her, he would crush up one of the supplements they’d created for the boys and put it in her breakfast in the mornings. For a week at least. Just enough additional vitamins and omega-3s and fish oil to kick her dormant elixir artifacts to life.

He opened the door of the restaurant for her and waited until she had stepped all the way inside before following. He’d managed a long scan of the parking lot and he was relieved by what he’d seen. Scanty patrons here tonight, and the vehicles that were parked nearby were pick-ups and rusting Honda Celics from a bygone era. 

The clientele would not pay overmuch attention to them, nor to him when he insisted on having his way.

Now that he was off the chain, now that his darker nature had been assimilated last night, assimilated and accepted once more, it would not be put back on the leash.

He squeezed her fingers between his and she came to heel at his side by the seat yourself sign. Her face turned expectantly towards his, both trust and wariness there.

“Far right, the booth. Same side, Beckett.”

She nodded, and he released her hand so she could take point.

He watched her careful and almost stumbling path through the tables towards the back booth, and he studied each twitch and withdrawal until he could read the pattern of pain in her body.

He was gratified to note it was mostly between her legs and at her ass.

She was bruised but only where it mattered was she beaten.

\-----

It wasn’t that she’d quit trying; she had just - paused.

It wasn’t that this version of Kate Beckett was the best version, but only that she’d had the shit beat out of her, mentally, and now she was ragged enough physically to have no energy to rebuild all those psychological pitfalls.

So if she was leaning against him with her eyelids half staff and her arm twined through his and that was completely unlike her, she could also say it was somehow more her, or the most of her she’d ever managed to find, even while she was too scrubbed raw to know what she was.

“Sit up a little, baby. Your calzone is getting cold. I cut it up for you. Just dip it in the sauce and chew.”

She sat up a little more, reached for her fork once again. She dipped the square of calzone he’d cut for her (her hands had been shaking and her muscles utterly worthless and every time she’d attempted it, she had slid the calzone right across the pizza pie plate and nearly onto the floor and she had thought oh God, I’m going to cry and he had tsked at her and taken over the whole damn project).

When she put it into her mouth, it was satisfying to know he’d cut her food for her like a queen. (Not a child, there was something about his demeanor and the glint in his eye, the way his hand wrapped around her knee, that could never be parent to child. He was burning, the wrath of him was enormous, but it wasn’t mean, wasn’t petty; it was only what betrayal deserved and he would not be him if she could get away with betraying everything they were.)

She swallowed her food and went back for another bite, sitting forward to shift off the places that were getting numb and too aware. Her body had settled into a dull ache from head to toe but it wasn’t the sharp and wincing pain of before.

It was enough though.

Castle’s heavy hand on her knee withdrew and she laughed as she fell into him, her support entirely gone. He chuckled in response and propped her up, pulling his phone out of his pocket with his other hand.

“Ah. Colin.”

She sucked in a harsh breath, pressed her face to Castle’s bicep. The muscle flexed as he lifted the phone to his ear.

“Yeah. She’s here.”

All of that hard-fought equilibrium was threatening to spill out.

“No, she’s back.”

Kate lifted her head and saw the look on his face, wondered what it was for, how she might not be measuring up-

“Of course they can.” He tilted the phone down, took the fork out of her hand. “Baby, talk to Wyatt. Finish that later.”

She choked on the sensation of floundering, rose back to the surface in the upswell of his confidence. She took the phone from him and put it to her ear and let out a breath.

“Hey, turkey.”

“Mommy, hi!”

A hot shame flashed through her like the emotional equivalent of a good cry, leaving her sagged against Castle’s side, her eyes closed. The sound of her baby’s voice, her five year old with his resilient and relentless joy.

“Did you need me for something, Wy?”

“Wow, you sound real tired, Mommy. Jay - Mom sounds really tired. I bet she don’t have-”

“Wyatt,” she scolded softly. “Talk to me, hon. Not James.”

“Oh, yeah, hi, Mommy!”

She breathed again, a kind of laugh in it, opened her eyes to find Castle smiling down at her. Whatever much of that he could hear. 

“Okay, honey, hi. Was that all?”

“Oh, no. No, I ‘member now, Mom.” That so-adult mom. “James made Daddy promise, but I need you to make Daddy promise too. That way it’s two that says.”

“What are you talking about, Wy?” Always redirecting him, always pushing and nudging him to find his train of thought and explain it fully. Tell me what you want, Wyatt.

“That Wolf can stay. No one gonna kick him out.”

“Wolf is staying,” she said firmly. “No one - no one - will touch him.”

“James is touching him.”

She scowled and glanced up at Castle; he would’ve had to have said-

Castle plucked the phone from her fingers and shook his head at her. “Wyatt. Mom says Wolf is just fine. You leave James alone if he’s trying to reach Wolf.”

Kate’s self-will subsided once more, and she found it almost bewildering just how easily it happened, switch from parent to whatever this was, less than herself, more than herself. She wasn’t, in this moment, the mother of two rowdy boys and their dog, two boys with interesting abilities and none of the maturity to handle them and their half-tamed wild wolf.

She was, right now, this.

The woman who was still leaning against Castle when he hung up once more and put his phone away. The woman who received the fork back from his fingers and tried another pre-cut bite of her meal, for him, because it mattered to him, and because she knew, somewhere dark and deep, that this was how it had to be sometimes.

How she had to be.

\-----


	16. Chapter 16

She was in the middle of the aisle searching for the deodorant he liked best - she had her own in the basket along with the shower gel they both used - when it came over her like a wave.

“Castle,” she called out, voice faint as the black spots grew before her eyes. “Rick.” She felt her fingers go nerveless and then the basket began to drop and she pressed her arm against her side to keep it from slipping.

“I’m here.” His voice first and then his whole body beside her, supporting her. “Just exhaustion. All your blood is going to your stomach to aid digestion and it leaves your head too fast.”

“Yeah,” she breathed. She had to close her eyes; her body would not tell her up from down. “Dizzy.”

“I got you.” His hand came flat to the space between her shoulder blades, brought her body into his so that her legs parted over his thigh. She was roused by the sharp twinges that spike between her legs and down her thighs, but she kept her eyes closed.

Breathed.

He rubbed her back and then gripped her nape, slowly massaged. “When you can make it to the front, there’s a bench outside. I want you to sit down and wait for me. The cold will help keep you clear.”

She swallowed and nodded, pushed back against his hand.

“No,” he said, resisting her so easily she collapsed to his chest. “Give it a second, Beckett. I said when you can make it.”

Her shoulders slumped, lashes closing.

“That’s better, love.” He left his hand heavy at her neck and his chin came to the top of her head. He took the basket from her arm, untangling it, and her body sank that much harder into him. “Oh, you found our soap.”

She laughed, an airy thing that sounded wrong somehow. “Yeah, babe. Was looking for your deodorant.”

“I got it.” She felt him lean out and snag something; she must have missed it with the black spots crowding her vision. He chucked it in the basket. “You go sit.”

She nodded, pushing back against him. Now he was letting her go, a squeeze at her elbow as he ushered her forward down the aisle. She went, and thought her steps felt light, she was making it.

Kate pushed through the front door and into the brittle cold outside, sank down to the bench just beside the mechanical plane ride for a dollar in quarters. Wyatt had always loved those as a toddler, but James had disdained those, as if he needed to save up their goodwill or indulgence for something much more impressive.

She leaned back against the bench, let its wood and metal take her exhaustion. 

James had never asked for anything though, had he? What was the more impressive thing he was waiting for, that he wouldn’t ride the mechanical planes of the world? He had been the more physically adept one of the two of them, at the beginning, trained as such, but once the boys had evened out under normative conditions, James had proved to be the far more cautious one.

Wyatt was their thrill-seeker. The one she could actually imagine following in his father’s footsteps in some ways, the one who adored Colin and drove Wolf crazy with his antics. James was still more naturally graceful, had never broken a dish or had a great fall, but he didn’t go looking for problems. 

Whatever John Black had intended for those boys, they were proving to be their own men, separate and apart from the things Black had tried to inculcate in them.

Sometimes they knew, but most times those boys had no idea what they’d been saved from. Though Castle was good about giving them stories, and Colin did his best to explain what had been a lifelong curse for him, James and Wyatt were still little boys. Curious James. Brash Wyatt.

She let out a long breath and opened her eyes, got to her feet. They needed to find a Sears or other free-standing department store, pick up a few changes of clothes. If he was done shopping at the dollar store-

“What did I say?” His voice was rough but his hand came to her shoulder and tugged lightly. “Baby, you nearly fucking passed out in there. Sit the hell down.”

She sank back to the bench and he came down with her, sank to the metal slats and leaned into it. She took the bag out toiletries from him and peered inside, checking to be sure he’d gotten everything.

He shifted to sprawl beside her, his legs wide and an arm spanning the back of the bench. His fingers twisted in the back of her t-shirt where she had leaned forward over the bag. 

She was aching in a lot of places. She hadn’t realized just how light-headed she still was, how the bruises were bothering her and the discomfort between her legs was more than just not fun.

“I bought Aleve,” he said, nudging her with a knee. “Take four. Prescription strength. Bottle of smart water in there too, with electrolytes. Right now, baby.”

She nodded and fished through the bag for the Aleve; she’d already pulled out the water bottle.

“Sip it, love. Keep sipping.”

She leaned back against him, letting his body warm hers, chilled as she was and now her fingers were frozen to the damp water bottle. She knew the Aleve couldn’t have already started working this fast, but she felt better against him.

His arm hooked around her neck and he roughly kissed the corner of her eye where she rested at his shoulder. 

“Sweetheart,” he murmured. “Kate.”

“Mm?”

“There’s a Saks about an hour from here-”

She shifted, frowning up at him. “Saks. Seriously, Rick. There’s a Sears in town-”

“No.”

She scowled.

He lifted an eyebrow, which he’d done a thousand times to her before, but this time, this instance, it was with the face that he’d had last night when he’d said, you don’t get to decide.

She swallowed.

“Saks is an hour down the road. There’s an empty bag in the back of the Subaru; we’ll fill it up. I’ve planned out two nights of stops.”

“Two?” They were maybe four hours from home.

“Two,” he said. “You almost passed out in the store. Two.”

She chewed on her bottom lip, but nodded. “I should-”

“No.”

She sighed and slumped into him, closed her eyes. She should a lot of things, but she couldn’t.

He wouldn’t let her.

And fuck, her guts felt rearranged. She’d woken up hurting and it hadn’t faded with time. It had only gotten stiff and achey and shitty.

She wanted to crawl in bed with him, her personal space heater.

\-----

He held her hand through Saks, not just because he liked holding her hand and it made him warm inside to feel her fingers fluttering against his knuckles, but also because he wanted to be sure he felt it the moment she crashed again.

She had the tendency to push right through to the end, the damn bitter end, and more than once he'd had to push her into a corner, holding her upright with his body, hissing at her to keep her shit together until they got clear of the danger. You're putting us all at risk, not just on mission but those boys at home too.

She hadn't learned. He wasn't sure she was able to learn, at this late in the game, after three years spent vitally and brutally dissociating herself from her own limitations. A skill she must have had in some natural form already or else she would never have survived.

And for that he was damn grateful and he would not complain. It had kept her alive. She was here to be here. With him. His.

"I like this," she murmured, a faint question in her voice. She reached out with their clasped hands and fingered a silky-sheer blouse, more summer than winter.

"Get it. We'll find a sweater for you."

"Oh. But-"

"No. No buts. Come on, love, grab that too. We have about seven here and I think that's the max for the dressing room-"

"No, I can't," she husked. She turned dark and watery eyes on him and he stiffened, entirely caught off guard by the intensity of her response.

"You can't?"

"Not - I'm not changing into - I can't - I'm not sure that I can bear to put clothes back on after I get them off. I just want to get them off and press into your skin until I can sleep."

She couldn't - she felt that bad. Holy shit, and she was telling him she felt that bad. 

Castle studied her once more and then shifted the clothes all to his other arm to free up his hand. She was chewing on her bottom lip and glancing around them, but he dug into his back pocket and pulled out his keys.

"Hey, love," he said, getting her attention. When her eyes came back to his, he could still see how churned up she was, edged out by pain instead of made dull by it. Probably, now that he was thinking about it, probably also by Colin's phone call and having to talk normally to Wyatt.

Shit.

She shifted on her feet.

"Kate. Take the keys and go back to the car. Lock the doors, crawl into the back and lie down."

"No, I-"

"I'm not asking," he said carefully, maintaining eye contact. But she broke, gaze falling to the floor. He moved the keys towards her free hand and nudged until she dutifully opened her palm. "Lie down. It's cold, but I won't be long."

She didn't refuse him again, but she didn't say yes either.

He took the pale silk top from the rack and added it to his pile, knowing it would fit (she had an eye for it, just as he did, though hers was instinctive and had to be prompted and encouraged while his was all training). "Go, Kate. Right now."

Her shoulders slumped and she turned, shifted towards the aisle of the Saks outlet. She glanced back at him once and he nodded towards the doors, keeping his eyes on her. He watched her walk carefully and painfully through the racks of clothing, through the juniors section and out to the front registers. She shied away from a woman pushing a cart and he saw how it nearly broke her, the sudden near-miss, but she kept going.

He watched her all the way through the floor-to-ceiling glass front of the store until she opened the back door of the Subaru and crawled in.

He would be quick, but she still needed socks and panties, and a pair of pajamas as well. He could do without, whatever it was, but they were stopping at the bed and breakfast two miles down the road and they were staying until she could stand up for longer than an hour.

\-----

The bed and breakfast he'd found for them was a farmhouse with converted outbuildings, so while Castle went into the main house to register them, she stayed curled up on the back seat while the rain spattered across the Subaru's roof.

When he came back, he had a brass key on a lanyard made of red yarn, and some paperwork that he tossed on the passenger seat. "I can drive straight to ours, unpack our stuff, and then come back for you."

"I could walk-"

He half-turned in the seat as he reversed out of the main house's parking lot, that sober look on his face. "No. You don't get to say, Kate."

She swallowed and closed her eyes, so very tired. She hadn't realized just how little she had left, but she had very little left. She had nothing, right now, and even though she'd eaten half of a calzone because he'd made her, it was like shoving things into a bottomless pit.

It just didn't do any good.

Which was why she had the tendency to stop, to quit or forget or just - stop. She stopped eating because it was easier to feed the boys and get them wrangled or work on her night class or train in the sparring room with Colin or hunt with Wolf in the midnight moonlight. It was just easier to not put food into her mouth and worry that something was actually very wrong with her, worry that it did no good at all, that she tried but her body was hopelessly fucked up by the elixir and it was never going to be thoughtless and easy again.

Colin called her a teenager diagnosed with brittle diabetes, rebelling against every good choice to go for the destructive ones as a way to deny it. Castle just called her frustrating as hell and wept in her lap when she hit the wall.

Well. He used to.

He wasn't doing that now. He was parking at the outbuilding, a cute white-painted shiplap with a wraparound porch and a porch swing that swayed in the rainstorm. She was cold but he'd bought sweatshirts and woolen socks and those black t-shirts that had once been his but now she stole, one by one, and wore until they fell off her.

Until the holes had holes.

"Stay," he said, opening the driver's side door. "I'm serious as fuck, Beckett. Stay."

"Staying," she promised. And why was that promise so easy when it usually made her want to crawl out of her own skin?

She wasn't even in her own skin right now. She was battered and sore and it hurt when she went to the bathroom but in a weird good way that made her wonder from time to time just what kind of fucked up she was.

And then she caught Castle's gaze on her and the blue flame in his eyes, the darkness that welled up between them and touched her own bleak darkness and then she didn't wonder at all.

He jogged towards the porch with their bag and unlocked the door, hustled inside and out of her view. She let her eyes close and was faintly surprised when the back door opened and rain spattered in over her ankles.

"Come on, baby. Sit up so I can get you."

She must have fallen asleep. She struggled upright and he reached in, hooked arms under her knees and neck, and he brought her against his chest. 

The rain was light and cool, and she tipped her head back, blinking slowly against the raindrops that scattered along her face. Castle shifted her against his body and she brought her head up, caught him looking at her. He shut the car door with a foot and then headed for the renovated chicken coop that would be their haven today. 

She wound her arm around his neck and pressed herself into him, the faint damp seeping into her clothes and her hair, against her face like tears. When he stepped up onto the porch, his boots echoed on the wooden planks and the wind made the chains of the porch swing creak.

She lifted her head once more, pointed her toes as Castle angled them through the doorway. Over the threshold, and as they went, he leaned in and brushed a too-soft kiss to her forehead, shut the door behind them.

“Here we are,” he murmured, lowering her legs to the floor. She stood up on her own, withdrawing her arm from his neck, but she had to grip his shirt as she swayed, closing her eyes tightly. He kept a grip on the back of her jeans, hanging onto her. “Probably not enough protein?” 

She nodded, but she barely had the capacity to calculate her levels right now. There was no way she knew after a month of hit or miss, but she ought to, and that was his point. “Not enough with just the sausage in that calzone.”

“I bought protein bars at the dollar store, and a box of those Lara bars too - for later tonight.”

“Thanks,” she sighed softly. Her knees were threatening to give way. “I... need to sit.”

“Shit. Baby, here, hang on.” He pushed her towards an overstuffed chair and lowered her into it, gripping the back of her neck to keep her from straight up collapsing. “I’ve got all the food over here in a bag.”

She sat uncomfortably perched at one edge, biting her bottom lip and breathing slowly as her bones shifted in her body. 

Damn.

Okay, so last night had been out of her mind intense, the most she had ever come in one session, at one time, but it had some serious consequences.

“Eat this.”

She glanced down; he was crouched before the chair as if submitting the food up to her. But that look on his face, no. No, he was in charge, and she would be eating the way she was supposed to, according to the plan they’d drawn up.

Kate reached forward and took the protein bar from his hand. He’d unwrapped it for her, doing everything to keep her from balking. She took a nibbling bite from the end and he lifted an eyebrow in warning.

She took a bigger bite, chewed slowly.

“I’ll unpack, and then we’ll work on getting you out of those clothes and into something not so abrasive.”

She swallowed quickly, trying not to choke, and nodded. “That would be good.”

“I know you hurt.” He laid a hand on top of her head as he rose to his feet once more. “We’ll work on that. I got some stuff.”

She glanced up, followed him with her eyes as he unzipped the bag and began laying new clothes into empty drawers. 

After a moment, he turned to her, pointing his finger. “Every time I put something away, you better fucking eat a bite.”

She gnawed the other corner and chewed even while he was still watching her. When he seemed satisfied, he turned back to unpacking.

She tried, she did it by rote, taking a bite mechanically until the whole thing was gone and her throat was knotted with the effort. Castle came back to her with yoga pants, a soft pajama top, and a bottle of something.

“IcyHot,” he said, nodding as he knelt before her. “Get you naked and in bed, how’s that?”

“You asking?”

He tilted his head, studied her. “Mostly rhetorical.”

She nodded and played with the wrapper of the protein bar until Castle took it out of her fingers and set it aside. She watched him, some strange anxiety slithering in her, but Castle was taking off her ballet flats.

She pressed her foot to his thigh and he circled his fingers around her ankle, leaned in to kiss her jean-clad knee.

And then he laid his cheek there and stayed.

Kate snaked her fingers through his hair and cupped the side of his face, circling his ear with her thumb. She tilted her head back agains the overstuffed chair and closed her eyes, letting them both off the hook for a moment.

She felt his breath against her wrist, and then his kiss, and he lifted his head and she did as well.

“Stand for me,” he murmured. His voice was soft but no-nonsense. “Strip. Lie down on the bed so I can rub this in.”

She stood because he asked, though she hadn’t thought she’d been able to. She turned and headed for the bed, taking hold of the hem of her shirt. But of course, Castle took over undressing her, pulling her shirt over her head, easing his fingers under the band of her sports bra at her side.

She sucked in a breath, felt the bruises at her spine, her shoulders, her collarbones where she’d been pressed into the rough wood floor. His body at her back gave off heat, and that did help a little, soaked into her aching muscles.

Castle pushed the sports bra down instead of trying to pull it over her head, and she swayed as his hair brushed her belly on the way down. She stepped out and he lifted his hands to the button of her jeans, unzipped them.

He was concise in his movements, nothing wasted, no tease. But she was plenty aroused all on her own, the way his fingers felt at her belly button, the press of a hand to a bruise, the scrape of his chin against her knee as he took off her jeans.

She let out a sigh, too battered to do anything about it, and he rose to his feet once more.

“Thought you said naked.”

He slipped a finger into the elastic of her panties. “Don’t want IcyHot down here, sweetheart. Burns like fire.”

“Already burns like fire,” she muttered.

He grinned - he liked it - and then he turned her around, nudging her towards the bed. She was shaky and heavy-feeling, and she slumped down to the thick mattress without his needing to make her.

“On your stomach first.”

She was already lowering herself down, but she paused to look at him. “Sit on me?” The weight of him at the backs of her thighs and ass while he gave her a massage always seemed to do it for her, made her relax.

He huffed, pressed her down with a hand between her shoulder blades. “Lie down.”

She shot him a glare and came up on an elbow. “I am.”

“The backtalk is adorable. Lie the fuck down.”

She flopped to the bed and pressed her cheek to the pillow, inhaled the scent of lavender and mint. And then IcyHot as Castle settled at her ass, and she groaned at his weight, lashes catching together.

His hands came to her shoulders and she winced, arching against the mattress as it both burned and stabbed through her. 

“Fuck,” she groaned.

“Not tonight, love. But thanks for asking.”

She laughed, opening an eye to look at him. He was grinning, close to her face, and he dipped forward and kissed the corner of her mouth. It was sweet, somehow, even as he kneaded the shit out of her back, pain both harsh and pointed all through her.

He kissed her again and lifted upright once more, digging his thumbs into the worst of her knots even as he re-bruised her in such a wonderful way.

She felt her body melting into the bed with every grip of his hands, the weight of him sitting at her thighs enough to keep her here.

And then she was dragged into a kind of waking doze, neither awake nor asleep, feeling her body being handled and manipulated and worked without her ability to move.

She had no idea how long it was like that, only that he was unlocking her, one knotted and complex padlock at a time, and she was opening for him in a way she didn’t think was possible.

\-----

When Kate had fallen asleep, Castle drew up the soft sheet and quilt over her shoulders, kissed her cheek. He stood up and moved to the bathroom, washing his hands free of the pungent smelling cream. 

The rain battered the windows now. From the bathroom, he could see out through the back yard, the dead grass and the stark tree branches that thickened as the forest clumped towards the main house. He could see one other renovated outbuilding - a small red barn - but there were no cars parked in the dirt drive to the right. They might be the only customers.

He wiped his hands dry on the lavender-scent towel and brought it to his nose, found the scent alluring for some reason. Maybe something Kate had at home, maybe just memory of a time they’d been together.

He settled a hip against the door frame and watched the rain sweep across the wrap-around porch. The afternoon was grey, clouds being whisked across the sky by the wind, and far in the distance, lightning licked the tops of trees. Thunder was a rumble that he felt faintly in his feet rather than heard, and he knew it would only get worse before it got better.

He hoped they were already on the better side of things, himself and Kate. He wasn’t sure how much worse he could survive, and most importantly, if she could survive it either. Last night a lot of things had finally clicked for him, how her perspective had gotten so skewed, how the work they’d done together to dismantle those self-destructive habits had in turn produced a deeper issue.

Fucking her hard when it got this bad would work again in the future, and a deep-seated version of himself was wholly willing to be the instrument of her punishment.

She fucking deserved it, letting that asshole touch her, wanting him to make her hurt, to fuck it all up, to ruin it so she couldn’t come back. His rage was low key at this point, mere simmer, but last night had at least taken the raw ache out of his grief.

Still really fucking sucked that she kept spiraling down into a pattern of behavior that tried so damn hard to hurt herself. 

But fucking her hard couldn’t be their only method of dealing with this. She needed a real therapist, not just him pushing and nudging her to speak, to give voice to the horror still lodged in her throat.

He’d ask Colin for help with this; the man had come up against more psychological professionals than Sybil, thanks to Black’s careful monitoring, and if anyone could find Kate the right fit, it would be him.

She’d balk. They’d have to deal with that somehow.

Thunder erupted suddenly from overhead and lightning made the bathroom glow. Eerie and green, as if the lightning had struck very close to them. Castle lifted from the door frame and turned around, saw Kate still sacked out in the bed.

He wouldn’t join her yet. She needed a few hours alone, and he needed to not have his naked lover pressed against his body right now.

He would take a shower, deal with himself there. (Shit, at this rate, he’d have to pump out a couple; his cock had throbbed throughout the whole massage and seeing her curled pitifully under the quilt was arousing all those fierce feelings in him again, the ones that demanded he press his body to hers and encompass her in whatever way he could).

Castle growled to himself and turned back to the bathroom, stripping off his shirt. He flipped on the shower, lukewarm, and toed off his shoes, got undressed.

But he left the door open in case she woke and needed him.

(He left the door open so he could see her, and trace her face with his eyes and watch her sleep while he jacked off, remembering every damn noise that had come out of her mouth while he’d taken her so roughly she’d be sore for weeks).

\-----


	17. Chapter 17

After his shower, he dragged on pajama pants he’d found in Saks, soft cotton with pinstripes, because he knew they’d feel good to her. He left his chest bare to cool off, and he sat at the headboard to call Colin.

As the phone rang, he dropped his hand to her back over the quilt, felt the heat of her through the covers. Her face was turned away.

Colin answered almost immediately. “Brother, how is she doing?”

“Asleep right now,” he said, clearing his throat. “She hadn’t been eating. Probably for a month or so.”

“Shit,” Colin sighed. “Her levels are fucked. Whoops, no, Wyatt, how about we don’t play with Wolf like that?”

Castle grunted, amusement bubbling up as he imagined just what fresh trouble Wyatt was getting into.

Colin came back on the line. “Look, Richard, she needs a fucking shot. I don’t care how fucking squeamish that makes you. If you won’t inject her, I for damn sure will.”

“No, I’ll do it. It’s already on my list. Soon as we get home.”

Colin was silent. And then he cracked a joke. “Right. Believe it when I see it.”

Castle didn’t want to explain, but - things had already changed. A sea change had occurred and it was important Colin was on board. “She’s not allowed to run again,” he croaked. It felt so fragile saying it out loud, his grief rising to the surface. “I used to think I was doing her a favor, not binding her to me, to us. I thought that was what she needed - to be free.”

“Castle-”

“She’s not allowed to run. Hard and fast limit, Col. She’s free. But doing a runner isn’t freedom. It’s suicide.”

Colin growled something that turned into a rebuke aimed at Wyatt, and for a moment, it was just Castle sitting stiffly on a strange bed with his whole life poised on the brink.

“She’s trying to kill herself?” Colin said then, coming back to the phone so quietly, Castle had been unprepared.

He looked down at the woman at his hip, saw the stranger she should have been all along. No connection, and they wouldn’t have been here. No touch of her soul against his, and here was this girl, this battered girl, sort of pretty but mostly broken.

His throat closed up.

“Rick. She tried to kill herself?”

“Yeah.” His eyes burned and he tilted his head back to keep from looking at her. “She - uh - she went to a bar, got blind drunk, and picked up a guy. Goaded him into fucking her against a brick wall-”

“What?”

“And then went upstairs with him, where he was too blind drunk himself to go again. She passed out, woke up sober enough to fall straight back into a panic attack.”

“Oh, God. Oh, God. She - she - fucked-”

Castle interrupted sharply. “Are the boys right there?”

“No, they’re messing with the dog. Fuck. Outside, they’re outside. Fuck.”

“We’ve worked it out, Colin. Not for you to go doling out punishment-”

“No, I wouldn’t. Okay, yeah, I’m a punitive bastard when you fuck up my brother. Fine. You worked it out. What the fuck-”

“She’s not allowed to run. She did it because she was trying to fuck up everything she loves, Colin. She was trying to burn every damn bridge so I’d be forced not to take her back. She had a panic attack, she ran, and that only made it worse.”

“Yeah, fuck, okay, no more - no more running. I... shit. Fuck, Castle, this is my fault. I was the one who told her that if she was going to do damage, she needed to fucking run away.”

“No,” he snapped. But, fuck, maybe part of him felt that was true. Let it all be Colin’s fault and then it wasn’t his. “No. If it’s anyone’s fault, it’s John Black’s. The rest of us are just trying to live our fucking lives out from under that fucking evil.”

“Yeah,” Colin said hollowly.

“The problem is that she thinks, when she’s in a panic attack or just irrational, that her existence does us damage. Okay? She thinks she’s going to hurt me the longer she stays.”

“It’s not irrational,” Colin grunted. “She did fucking stab you-”

“Shut the fuck up, Colin.”

“I’m not saying she’s too dangerous to live. I’m not saying put her down. I’m saying that she’s not crazy. I’m defending her, Castle. She has done some fucking badass shit to people, you and I have both seen her flip - just go - without warning. She knows that crazy is inside her and fucking hell, no wonder she thinks she’s a ticking time bomb. That kind of shit is not easy to reconcile.”

“We’re not going over this again,” he said tightly. She was not going to flip out on him. She was not going to do him damage.

“You might not want to, but I am. Because it’s obvious that still scares the fucking shit out of her. She thinks she’s going to fuck you up, her sons. You think that’s easy to live with?”

“I - no. I know-”

“So you’re approaching this wrong, Castle. You can’t come at it saying oh that’s just the panic attack talking. Because she and I both know the panic attacks are brought on by the literal fucking truth of her dark side.”

Her dark side.

His dark side.

“I - showed her.” He pulled his knees up in the bed and bowed his head forward over them. “I showed her I could handle her dark side. I - she’s not passed out right now because of her levels.”

“She’s not - what?”

“She’s passed out because of me.”

Colin was silent.

Castle grit his teeth, opened his eyes. From his bowed position, he could see a faint sliver of her arm out from under the quilt, the pale flush of her skin and the bruises, and then her cupped palm, curled innocently, open to him.

He lifted his head, got a deeper breath.

“She’s dark, but so am I. Black fucked her up, but he did it to me too. I won’t pretend that it’s all just fine, but I’m not going to believe it can’t change, that it can’t get better, find a balance. This is what I want - Kate is what I want, and I’m keeping her.”

“You beat the shit out of her.”

Castle huffed, pushed his body back against the metal headboard in frustration. “I didn’t beat her.”

“She deserved it. But you didn’t-” Colin grunted. Laughed. “Holy fuck. I did not need to know that, Castle. You fucked her like - fuck. I don’t need a fucking visual in my head.”

“Well, I’m pretty sure the moment we see you again, you’ll get a few visuals.”

“Fuck.”

Castle grinned. “Pretty much.”

“Oh, hell. Bloody fucking hell. Nice one, Richard. Excellent. I’m buying those fucking copper-lined gloves now. I don’t care how damn expensive they are.”

Castle laughed over the phone, something in his body easing. He had needed - not that he needed permission, but maybe he had just needed someone else to know. More than just the two of them, fucked up as they were, someone who knew them and knew the truth.

Someone who loved them - separately - and could pass judgment.

“Did I do the right thing?” Castle said into the phone.

Colin went quiet. And then, “I can’t decide that. We’ll see over the next few weeks, won’t we? If that’s what - she needs. But if you’re serious, you’d give her an injection - you will actually do that to her - then that’s at least one thing. Because she fucking needs it.”

“I think we both needed it,” he sighed.

“Ew. As Wyatt would say. Speaking of, shit. I gotta go. Your kids are demon-spawn.”

And then Colin hung up on him.

Castle lowered the phone and his eyes to Kate.

He sank down into the mattress, came close, close, not touching. He reached out one hand and snaked a strand of hair back off her face. 

She had been living intimately with her dark side for all this time, and he had kept steadfastly refusing to believe in it. His or hers.

But that wasn’t the way.

He withdrew his hand, the phone tucked under the pillow, and he watched her sleep.

\-----

He hadn’t been lying more than thirty minutes when the phone buzzed in his hand under the pillow.

He answered, straightening up in bed. “Col?”

“We have an animal control problem. Your kids are feeding another wild thing.”

“Wait, what?”

“I caught them sneaking food outside to feed a stray.”

Castle groaned, scraping a hand down his face. “What stray. Oh, fuck, those raccoons. That’s why-”

“Not the raccoons, though I guess they’re getting fed too. More than this mangy beast is.”

“What are they feeding, Colin?”

“A dog.”

Castle laughed, shaking his head. “Of course they are. A neighbor dog?”

“We don’t have neighbors. A stray. A drop-off. I don’t know, but this thing is huge, Castle. German shepherd and some kind of mastiff. Border collie. I don’t know, but fuck, this thing is huge but it’s skinny as a rail.”

“And they’re feeding it.”

“They’re trying to. I made them take food back-” Colin cut off, cursing, and Castle waited, knowing that meant one of the boys was trying something. “Hang on. James. No. No. We’re not putting food out. That’s why we have raccoons dumping out our trash and tunneling into our roof. No.”

“Let me talk to James,” Castle called through the phone. “Colin. Put James on.”

Beside him, Kate stirred. He lowered his voice and tried again.

“Colin, put-”

“Dad?”

“James,” he said in relief, hunkering down beside Kate. “Col says you guys are trying to feed a stray?”

“Dad,” James protested.

“Tell me. Full story.”

“I found her first,” James sighed. “We call her Dog. We weren’t hiding her. Just - she hangs out in the forest back there, near the river, and we see her a lot. But Wolf keeps running her off.”

Fuck. That was why Wolf had been on edge lately, why Wolf had bit Wyatt. Another fucking animal creeping in on Wolf’s territory. “James. Dogs don’t get along with Wolf. You know-”

“I know. But she’s starving. She’s going to die if we don’t feed her. She’s not wild, Daddy, she doesn’t know how to make it.”

“Shit.” He pressed his hand over his face. “Can you - do you think you guys can catch her? How do you know it’s a her?”

“I can’t catch her. She’s huge. Dad, don’t tell Colin to do it.”

“Why not?” But he knew. Colin wasn’t sympathetic to the wild things. He shot the raccoons and badgers and the wolves, and the boys had Kate’s wild heart. “Alright. James. Okay. I’ll catch her myself when I get there. I’ll tell Uncle Colin you can keep feeding her until we figure something out.”

“Thanks, Dad.”

“James.” He called his son back before he could go. “You’re feeding the whole damn forest, you know.”

“I am?”

“You are. We’ve had more animals up by the house this last month, and that makes Wolf irritated, all those other animals on his territory - not to mention the dog.”

“Oh.”

“How would you feel if Mom and I brought home another little boy and fed him and worried about him and tried to catch him - all in front of you? And then we yelled at you to go to your room and stay there.”

“Oh.” James made a noise on the phone. “I’d be mad. I... did you?”

“Did I what?”

“Mommy didn’t - find other little boys to love better?”

“Fucking hell, James, I was making a point. No. That is not - that will not happen. You guys aren’t the reason.” Shit, how long had the boys felt like this? Thought this somewhere in the back of their minds and not had words for it. “Mom can’t love anyone better than she loves you. James. Are you listening to me?”

“Yeah.” His voice was small, like he’d hidden somewhere and was trying to keep from crying.

“You know what Mom did for you.” Where the fuck had Colin gone? Could he not see that James wasn’t acting right? That he sounded so small over the phone. “You know how much she loves you.”

“Tell me the story?”

Castle sucked in a long breath. “Where are you, son? Are you in the kitchen?”

“I’m in the living room. On the couch.”

“Is Wyatt or Uncle Colin-”

“Uncle Colin took Wyatt out back to find Wolf.”

“Wolf ran off again, huh?” He cleared his throat and sank down to the pillow once more, Kate’s face before his. But James didn’t have that right now. “Jay, lie down on the couch like it’s bedtime, and I’ll tell you Mom’s story.”

James let out a little breath and he could hear the boy getting comfortable. 

“Mom was nineteen,” Castle started, “when the bad guy killed her mother. Johanna.”

“Dragged her away.” James voice was tight on the phone. Maybe five meant understanding more than before.

“Hush, I’m telling the story.” He waited but the rough rebuke had gone over well, normalized James’s breathing. “He dragged Kate away, and he sold her to Black, the man who had me and Uncle Colin, and Alex and Ben.”

“Get to the good part, Daddy. This is all sad.”

He grunted and laid his fingers lightly on Kate’s forearm. The good part. “You were growing in Kate’s stomach, and she had someone to talk to, someone all her own, and she wasn’t alone with Black any more. She told you to grow strong and courageous-”

“That means I’m brave.”

“Brave,” he repeated softly. “She told you to stop kicking her, and to settle down and go back to sleep. And she told you that you guys were buddies now, you were all each other had. You would have to stick together.”

“But then Wyatt.”

“And then you were born and you were two,” he said, chuckling at James’s put-out sigh, though he heard the faint thrill in it too. “Two boys instead of one, and now Kate had two little people on her side, two more to love. And she loved you so much, James; she knew you from the beginning. And when Black tried to be mean, you and Wyatt wouldn’t let Kate be alone. You forced him to let you stay with her.”

“How did we do that, Daddy?”

“You stopped living,” he murmured. He wished he was there to kiss his son’s face, to make him feel what Castle felt. “You and Wyatt stopped eating, stopped playing, stopped sleeping. You were very small, and it was all you had control of to do, but you did it.”

“And we got Kate back!”

“You got your mommy back. And she came to hold you and rock you every night.”

“And then Mommy knew we loved her too, right?”

“Mommy knew. Of course she knew. And she knew she had to get you all out of there. Because she loved you so so much. So she made herself get very sick. So very sick that she was dying, she had stopped living too, just like you guys did. Black came to see her personally, to make her better, but Kate was smart and she had it all planned out. She cut herself free and she stabbed him in the neck and he gushed out blood and he died.”

“Yay!”

His heart flipped, as it always did when he told this part of the story. “Kate was free. Finally free. But you know who else was free now that the monster was dead?”

“Me and Wyatt. And you and Uncle Colin. And Alex and Ben. And all the other baby boys Mommy never had.”

“Exactly. We’re all free of the monster. Because Kate - because your mommy loved you so so much.”

“Is Mommy coming back soon?”

“Yes, James. Two more days. This one, and the next, and then the morning.”

“I love her. Will you tell Mommy I love her?”

“Of course, Jay. Be careful with the stray dog.”

“Oh, Uncle Colin found Wolf! I gotta go, Daddy.”

And the phone was hung up.

\-----

She woke up alone and turned carefully in the bed, wincing as her body pulled. She opened her eyes to the empty side, pushed her hand out along the cool sheets to skim the pillow.

He had left clothes for her. The long-johns, a pair of black yoga pants, the wool socks, the thermal henley (charcoal grey, and so soft she could swear it was made with cashmere). She sat up slowly, her body aching in places foreign and domestic, taking breaths with caution until she ascertained that her ribs weren’t bruised.

Of course they weren’t. But she had that full-battered feeling she’d had after it had gone bad in the warehouse outside of Cambridge, when the explosives had gone off during their gunfight with Black’s operatives, and the wall had come down on them, and Castle had thrown his body over hers and yet still she had been crushed.

She had been crushed this time, and again Castle had done the crushing, but to save her. It was the same feeling.

She had no panties; she did not go looking for them, merely pulled on the waffle-weave long-johns and wondered when she would stop feeling like opening her legs would allow everything to fall out. 

The waistband was thick and narrow, ensuring that they’d stay up under the yoga pants, which were of a denser, manmade fabric and clung to her hips and ass. She ached and it was apparent in her every movement, a reminder of last night and the nights leading up to it, of a month’s worth of locking herself in the bathroom to breathe through a panic attack or lying awake in bed beside him because she was sure he had no idea how to help her.

She had been desperate to have him save her, and help seemed too small and meager. Help seemed an exercise in foolishness, a pointless attempt when she was so far removed from all normal life.

She had felt - damned.

It wasn’t a religious thing; she wasn’t religious. But condemned, beyond salvation - those words resonated and found meaning for her in her darkness.

Kate sucked in a long breath and tried to clear herself of the thoughts that so easily entangled. She did not know if she could explain to him what it was she felt was different now. Not just that she had done the unimaginable and come through on the other side - with him still by her side - but that their relationship and her position in it was altered.

She had not believed.

And now she did.

It was not faith. It was not religion. But she was no longer damned. Or if she was, her damnation did not mean exile from all she loved and found worth in, from life. It was only one more thing to work into their daily living.

She had been wrong about it. About him? She wasn’t sure which, or how it had changed things, but when she thought about the blank space when she’d woken up, when she pulled the henley over her head and straightened the hem, she thought about finding him and filling the empty place with him.

When she stood up on wool-clad feet, she found the fleece pullover he’d left at the foot of the bed. As if he knew her, and knew she would come looking. Even in that, it was a clue, an easy sign-post pointing her towards him.

She pulled it on as well and pushed her hands into the pockets, tucking her chin back into her neck to keep her ears warm, brushing the fleece’s collar. She opened the front door of the converted chicken coop, narrow and warm despite the wood floors and shiplap walls, and she stepped out onto the wraparound porch.

He was lying on the porch swing, the chains barely making a sound as the thunderstorm pushed it back and forth. He saw her and put his foot down to stop it, and she came and sank down in the scant space at the narrow taper of his waist.

His hand came to her hip and under the pullover, the henley, his warm fingers to her skin. She watched his eyes and the thunderstorm on his face, and the flop of hair that she loved so cleanly, without significance, and the crooked smile he gave her that had such significance, all that meaning, and she laid down on top of him.

He grunted and huffed, an arm banding around her lower back to prevent her from falling off him, his toes skidding the porch as the swing rocked. He adjusted and she stayed where she was, and eventually they settled into a comfortable enough space.

She didn’t need cushions or more comfort; she needed to feel slightly out of joint, she needed to feel like he was making the effort to keep her. She didn’t know if those were healthy feelings, but they were true, and she knew them now.

She laid her cheek to the slant of his chest where his shoulder met the back of the swing. She closed her eyes.

All this and they had neither of them said a word.

His fingers began to play with her hair. She felt herself drifting, but she was not zoning out. She was only swinging slightly in the thunderstorm, this calm eye where nothing could be quite as important as him.

\-----

He laughed under her as the lightning made her jump, pressed his hand to that spot between her shoulder blades as she shifted over him.

“Shut up, don’t laugh at me.”

He chuckled a little more just because she’d said it, and her teeth came out against his neck and bit, a little bite, more sensation than tearing.

He cupped the back of her head so that his arm hid her face and he palmed her ear, kissed her where he could find skin. “My wild girl,” he hummed, pleased with her, pleased to have her back.

She stopped squirming, released his neck from her teeth with a touch of her tongue. “I didn’t think you liked me.”

“What?” he laughed, fingers clutching her hair. He got a hank of it, lifted it to his nose, closed his eyes.

But her voice was serious. “I think that was my fundamental error. I didn’t think you could like me like I was, like I am.”

He froze. “Are you serious?”

“Yes,” she sighed, flattening her palm against his arm and curling her fingers around his muscle. “No, don’t-” as he tried to shift upwards and see her face “-it’s fine now. I understand. I didn’t before. I thought I was just too - fucked up.”

“Kate-”

“A mess. I’m a mess. And worse than that, Castle, I have this side to me that is so dark.”

“I know,” he protested, squeezing the back of her neck. “I know-”

“I know you know,” she gave, nails in his bicep to get his attention. “I do know. Now. I didn’t before, but I see that now. I - feel it every time I move. How very much you know me.”

His panicked heart was beginning to find baseline again, though he was breathing hard, clutching her, trying to make sense of what she’d so casually revealed. “Kate. I love you.”

“I know you do.”

“But have you known-”

“Of course,” she said simply. Her head lifted and she settled her chin on his sternum. He couldn’t see her even still but she saw him. “But I didn’t believe - or I didn’t know how to believe. And you showed me how.”

“I showed you...” How to believe in his love for her. Why did that taste bad going down?

“I don’t know how to explain it. But I thought you should know that it’s different now. It’s not just - I don’t know. You should have turned away in disgust, but you didn’t. You - took me back.”

“You were never gone,” he insisted, gripped her neck. He angled his mouth down to hers, guided only by his grip at the base of her skull, and their lips clashed, her teeth in it, his anger, his misunderstanding.

She pushed back with a fierceness he hadn’t seen coming, and she lifted up over him, straddling his ribs, leaning on her hands, her hair dark where it fell forward. Rain scattered across the porch from a gust of wind and it set the swing to rocking, her hair fluttering.

“You love me not in spite of but because of. And I had never - thought that was possible for me.”

Because of her darkness, because of the way it took her sometimes, because of the fight and the horror and the blood. 

“You were the one,” he husked, lifting a hand to catch her hair and push it back. “You were the one who said you didn’t think you could be with anyone normal. Normal was closed to you. Kate, honey, what did you think I meant when I said I’d never been normal?”

She shook her head, tear-blinded, and he pressed his thumb under one eye to make the drops fall. They landed on his bare chest, stinging where the wind snaked between them and cooled his skin.

“I won’t ever be normal, Kate,” he said roughly, rubbing out the tracks of wetness on her face. “That’s the one thing I can give you - this not-normal, fucked up, black life we have.”

She sucked in a breath and nodded, and her hips rocked against him so that she let out a little cry.

He gripped her hip with his free hand, kept her still. “No, baby. Not tonight. Not for a while. We’ve done that, it’s done.”

“But I could-”

“No.” He felt her jaw shifting where he gripped her too hard, but he didn’t let up. “What we did last night took care of one part of your penance, love. The rest of it is this.” He gestured between them, then went ahead and shifted his hand to her groin, knuckling her clit.

She groaned and dropped down to her elbows, her whole body shaking in what he knew was pain, and not pleasure. She was chafed raw, bleeding, there was no doubt in his mind this would be penance.

He withdrew his hand from her and instead combed her hair off her face where she’d fallen against him.

“Abstinence,” he murmured at her ear. “This is the last of it, and the greatest part. You’re not allowed to come.”

She wept on top of him, and he bound her up in his arms, set the swing to rocking slowly side to side.

\-----


	18. Chapter 18

She fell asleep and woke, drugged with her own exhaustion.

Castle combed her hair, damp now from the rain in the wind, but her skin was warm where he protected her from it. His own body was perpetually heated and it kept hers as well, and so he didn’t worry too much about being out in the elements on the porch.

She roused again, dragged her hand up his side to curl at his shoulder. “No touching at all?”

“I didn’t say no touching. I said no fucking.”

She sighed, fingers tracing the hair at his armpit where it met his chest. “I guess that’s better.”

“You guess? You’re a slut for me, and you know I love it, but after what we did last night, Kate, there has to be a stop. Or else it can never happen again. There are rules, even if you didn’t feel them.”

“I feel them,” she muttered. Tugged an armpit hair.

He hissed and clamped his arm down, flicked her ear. “Stop that. Listen to me. If you want no fucking limits, no holds barred, then you will damn well follow the rules after.”

She huddled in against him.

“Do I have your agreement?” he prodded.

“Yes.” She was squirming on top of him. “But I could take you in my mouth and-”

“I might take you up on that, but there’s penance of my own to do, love.”

She fell silent. Didn’t bring it up again.

He relaxed again, brought his arm up around her shoulders, digging his fingers into her hair once more. Her shoulders slumped. He took it for acceptance.

The storm threw a scattering of rain against the roof and the far side of the porch. He dropped a foot to push off against the wooden planks, stroked the side of her face with his fingers. Thunder boomed close by and the lightning came soon after, barely a pause between them.

“Right on top of us,” he mused.

She didn’t reply, just a faint hum between their skins, and he dug his toe into the ground to push them back. The swing rocked slowly and the wind was cold against his skin. Kate pressed her nose into his neck, and he shifted his hand to give her more protection.

“Getting good out there.”

She shifted, peering out from behind his arm. “I couldn’t just - touch you a little to make us both feel better?”

He laughed, struck by how petulant her voice was, how she was fighting back in her own way. “Not tonight. Not tomorrow night. After that, I’m sure we can fit it in.”

“Hard time fitting it in for all that.”

He grinned, combed his fingers in her hair. “Thank you for that, and while flattery will normally get you everywhere, baby, this time-”

“You mean business,” she sighed. She pressed her nose back to his neck and pulled her arms into her chest. “Two days?”

“How long we have this place. Two nights.”

“Oh.” Her finger flicked against his skin. “What about the boys?”

“I’ve talked to them. And Colin. They’re fine.”

She squirmed. “You’ll call before bed?”

He remained silent for a moment, trying to figure out what the right answer here was. “I don’t normally,” he gave. “They’re used to Col.”

“Oh,” she murmured.

He arranged her hair behind her neck, rubbed his thumb at the shell of her ear. “When we’re out, honey, we won’t be calling to put them to bed, you know. In the middle of an assignment, we don’t have that kind of time, but more than that, we’re off radar-”

“No, I know,” she said. “But we’re... not out. We’re here.”

“We’re out.”

She sighed, her fingers rubbing against his chest. Back and forth. She was thinking.

“No,” she said finally. “We’re here. We won’t be for long. We should call.”

“Did you just tell me no?”

Her shoulders hunched. She lifted her head, stared at him. No apprehension, but maybe some wariness.

He grinned, gripped the back of her neck. “Good to have you back, babe.”

“Shut the fuck up,” she huffed, dropped her cheek back to his chest. She flicked his nipple, hard, and he gripped her fingers, crushing his arm at her neck.

“We’ll call,” he promised. “You follow my rules, I can follow yours. Be good for us.”

She flattened her thumb to his nipple, nodded against his chest.

He didn’t want to tell her about James earlier. Figured that wouldn’t go over so hot right now. She might be reasserting herself, finding her balance again, but that was sure to set her back. Just a kid, usual questions, but throwing that connection into the mix made things different, complex.

“Was I - did we...”

“You were wonderful,” he sighed. “So pliant, begging me. Your ass so pink and-”

“Holy shit, Castle,” she laughed, knocking her head into his chin. “Shut up. Don’t go seducing me now. You won’t let us fuck.”

He grinned. “What were asking then?”

“Not that. I was there; I know what we did. And how fucking hot it was.”

“What then,” he chuckled, untangling the hair behind her ear where his fingers had mussed it.

“How long did I sleep?”

“Just now? Only a few hours. You could use at least six more.”

“Um. What about dinner?”

“You hungry?”

“Not really,” she sighed. “But I should to keep my levels - or well, to normalize them again. I guess. Do you have any idea what-”

“Yeah, I got an idea. I bought peanut butter in town, at the dollar store. High protein should work.”

“And green vegetables,” she murmured.

“We can hit that in the morning, omelettes.”

“You have-”

“I asked the owner here. She has farm fresh eggs and she promised to run in for kale and spinach.”

She was silent for a moment, then rubbed her thumb against his skin. “You thought of everything.”

“That’s my job, love. Take care of what’s mine.”

Her arm snaked around his neck and tightened. “You do. You take care of us so well.”

“You,” he whispered. “Taking care of you, sweetheart. Top priority.”

\-----

They sat cross-legged on the back porch facing each other with the jumbo jar of crunchy peanut butter between them and a couple sleeves of stale crackers. He’d found raisins too, and she dotted her peanut butter with the dark little fruits before popping the whole cracker in her mouth, chewing messily.

He had filled their water bottles from the tap and it was good enough, especially with the peanut butter sticking to her gums. She had the sleeves of the pullover pushed up, the soft henley and one of his t-shirts under that, but she felt none of that usual heaviness of layers without real heat, the cognitive dissonance of protection that came with weakness, places where the cold crept in. 

Not here. Not now. Not today. His body blocked most of the wind and the protein in the peanut butter was kickstarting her system, firing up old dormant code that began working in her mitochondria to produce energy once more.

She wasn’t warm like Castle, but she wasn’t cold. And it had been a long time since she hadn’t been cold.

Kate chewed on her lower lip, refusing tears.

Castle suddenly nudged her knee with his, and she glanced his way and found him looking out into the rainstorm. She turned her head and followed his line of sight and saw the two young male deer that had just broached the tree line.

They were standing before a fenced-off garden between the back woods and the converted chicken coop, their ears flicking off rain drops, back and forth, listening for predators. One lowered his head and she could see the nubs of his antlers where they were just beginning to sprout, and then he nibbled at the grass with all the particular carefulness of James.

And then the second spurted into a trot and came to rest a few feet beyond his brother, cropped the grass with all of Wyatt’s indulgent joyfulness, not a lick of care about him.

She grinned and felt Castle’s fingers curling around hers, dislodging the cracker she’d been about to spread with peanut butter, and she gripped his fingers back instead.

The two deer munched the bare carpet of winter grass, even attacked the base of the trees, before strolling all too casually towards the garden. One poked his head between the rungs of barbed wire and jerked back, the other tried to reach his head over the top like a giraffe. Neither were successful, and they made frustrated noises that burst from their chests, startling birds and Kate as well.

“We don’t have any carrots or-”

“No, honey.”

She sighed and watched them eye the fence before giving up and fading back into the woods, slipping from sight as if going through some magic portal. All the while, the rain was still pouring down, soaking the landscape with color despite the dreary grey. It was only four or so and the sun might have just been setting but the light was somehow still pearled amidst the clouds and dimly perceived in the open air.

It was not night but it was not day, and this liminal space was somehow a thing all her own. It belonged to her, with her, and she to it, in it. This was her natural environment, this was the place she might feel at home - if ever anything was home.

She didn’t want to call the boys. She wanted to watch Castle eat crackers and suck peanut butter from his thumb and surreptitiously watch her for signs of having her fill. She wanted their eyes to meet and clash and his questions to come so that she would answer, and find the words, and somehow bridge the distance from before and after.

Only she didn’t know what all counted as before, and after was as big a mystery as life itself.

“I’ll buy some carrots tomorrow,” he said in the middle of her silence. “And salt. They like salt.”

\-----

“What are you doing?” she asked from the open front door.

He had headed inside, hunting for something, and she had thought he was looking for food for the deer, but of course she should have realized. If he said they had no carrots, they had no carrots; he was exceedingly thorough. He knew.

“Ah-ha,” he said softly, a slide of his lips upward in a grin. He held aloft a pack of playing cards and wriggled them, came back outside with her, leaving the door open.

“The heater is still on in there,” she pointed out.

“So?”

She shrugged, rolling her eyes at him, and he padded barefoot across the wooden porch to sit back down in his same spot. She followed because the idea of a card game with him intrigued her - they’d played silly games with the boys when they were toddlers, and these days it was Trouble or Monopoly - and she supposed there was something in a game that appealed to him. She wanted to be part of that.

“What’re we playing?” she asked, crossing her legs and putting her elbows on her knees.

He was shuffling the cards against his chest when he glanced up, and she thought he was going to say strip poker only he didn’t. “Crazy Eights?” His eyebrows wriggled and she laughed and he grinned back. “Thought it was appropriate.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Hey now.”

“Love me some crazy, sweetheart.”

She took the hand he was dealing, waved him off at four. “Something different. Not the kids’ games.”

“Oh?” A strange look came over his face, one she had lately begun to identify as sheepish. She had no idea what it was for. “What did you have in mind?”

“Texas Hold ‘Em,” she gave easily. “Madison and I used to have a ring going senior year. Bilked all the boys of their parents’ money.”

But instead of that lazy predatory look that usually came into his eyes when she talked about her senior year antics, his lashes dropped. His hands were still on the cards. “I don’t know that one.”

“Oh? Easy. I’ll teach you. Here, give ‘em here.”

He let out a little breath, passed over the cards, and gave her an odd look.

“What?” She raked the cards back into the deck, trying to study him. He didn’t gave away much when he wanted to keep his cards close to the vest, so to speak. “Castle. What.”

“I don’t know any games,” he huffed. “I don’t know any real games. Like what the fuck do people play? I-”

“Rick,” she injected, but he kept going.

“There are board games in there that I’ve never even seen. I don’t have any idea. But I bet you know every damn one of them. I grabbed a deck of cards because at least Wyatt taught me Crazy Eights, at least I can give you that much-”

“Rick,” she insisted, leaning forward to catch his hands. Maybe poker was too much, try something that required no skill, no thought. She’d teach him poker tomorrow, before they left for home, when he wasn’t so worked up over nothing. “Baby, hush.”

His jaw snapped shut, but his eyes were mulish and troubled.

She ignored the still-throbbing ache of her whole body and came up on her knees, the wind circling the porch and scattering leaves across the wooden planks. The porch swing creaked as she slid into his lap, straddling his hips, but she crossed her legs behind him and hooked her ankles, wound her arms around his neck.

“I don’t need you to know how to play some random board game. You know that’s not what I need. Sweetheart. Look at me.”

His eyes connected with hers and even though none of this was really physically seducing him into believing her, believing the best of himself, the words and the closeness of her body were doing it anyway. Her words, her love for him - those things translated here too.

“Rick Castle,” she murmured, pressing her lips to his ear but keeping her whole body still. Not biting his ear lobe, not grinding into his crotch. Just being close. “You come after me when I call. You keep me when I wrong us. You fuck me senseless to right my wrongs. I need that. I love that. Not board games and babies and birthday parties. I love you, as you are, because you love me as I am.”

The cards were forgotten as he wrapped his arms around her and buried his face in her neck. She held him against her and not for a second did she think this is my fault.

She knew it was the fault of John Black, that he had broken them, made them into these shadows of themselves. 

But they were knitting together something better, stronger, for all that. They were more.

\-----

He hadn’t orchestrated that, but it had worked out to their advantage. It had just been an ordinary temper tantrum - he did that sometimes; it all just bubbled up in him, how fucking unfair it was, how poorly equipped emotionally he’d been to be of any use to her - but fuck if his neediness hadn’t brought her out of herself.

Kate had slapped his cheek with a kiss against his eyebrow, climbed out of his lap. She’d found another deck of cards in the side table next to the couch where he’d plucked the first one, and she’d come back to the porch with him.

She was teaching him a game called Demon, in which they had to race to get rid of their deck of cards, playing in the middle or playing on their own solitaire set up. It wasn’t that hard, it was just having good hand-eye coordination and fast reflexes, and they had both been trained for that.

It was fun. She cheated like crazy, laughing at him as he sputtered, the storm taking their cards and Kate rearranging them wrong and the lightning illuminating her face like she was a goddess. 

Castle liked playing games with her. They needed to do this more often.

She had strategy and she had reflexes, and he had ignorance and reflexes as well, slightly faster than her, and he learned, and soon he was trumping her every time. She went to play her two of diamonds and he beat her to it - reading her movement before she had the chance to execute, he was there, slapping his own two of diamonds onto the pile. She growled and spit and called foul, but that was the fun, that was the hilarity of it, and she was chortling when she snapped a play out from under him.

They played hand after hand, keeping track of the score in their heads, double points for what you had left in your hand and negative points for what you’d played, and they were close, they were both very good at it. First to one hundred lost, but it was going to take ages to get there, so good were they both.

When he had ninety-three and she had ninety, he called a truce. It was close to eight and full dark, the clouds heavy, the most dangerous part of the storm rolling through. He wanted to press his mouth against every part of her, worship her, but he couldn’t, it wasn’t allowed, they were both doing penance, and in this moment of electric looks between them, they both knew now how harsh a punishment it was.

She shuffled her cards before replacing the rubber band, and then she stood up, her hand on his shoulder to steady her. Instead of going inside and returning the deck to its drawer, she leaned a hip against the porch railing and watched the lashing of the storm.

Castle stood, still shoving cards into the cardboard container, his eyes glued to her. She half-turned her head and and caught her fingers in the waistband of his pajama pants, tugged until he stepped closer. He took her deck of cards from her and put it with his, slid his arm around her waist and pulled her back into his chest.

She tilted her head to his neck and slotted her forehead against his cheek; he felt her eyelashes where they caught his skin. She stroked two fingers along his forearm and watched the thunderstorm rage and batter at the woods, the clearing of land, the garden. The wind howled across the porch now, flattening his pajama pants to the his calves, and he tightened his arms around her, nestling his head beside hers.

The laughter between them had faded but the feeling had not; it lived on in the amusement of watching the bare winter garden get pounded flat by the cold rain, the smile in watching two winter geese poke their heads out from under the stilted chicken coop (neither he nor Kate had known they were sheltering here), and the general feeling of being alive in the middle of all this power, awake and aware and thriving despite the hammering they’d taken.

She turned in his arms and wrapped her own around him, up on her toes and tightening her elbow at the back of his neck, pressing chest to chest. They knew they could do nothing about it, the ache that lived inside, that begged for his body to invade hers, but it was a fine and terrible thing to hold her and want her and know he couldn’t do anything about it.

She could convince him, they both knew that; but she didn’t, and he could weep with relief.

He cupped her face and sipped a kiss from her swollen, mangled lips - a mouth bruised and cut by his own fierce domination twenty-four hours ago - and she touched and touched her lips to his, her tongue, noses rubbing, until she sighed and released him once more.

“Come to bed,” she murmured. “I’m so tired. I want you to hold me.”

\-----

At first, she didn’t fall asleep.

At first, she was battered and tired and bruised, and her hips wouldn’t sit right and her legs felt out of socket even as Castle tried to fit himself against her.

At first, she was too worn out to find a way to rest.

But his heat slowly seeped into her through the henley, his thigh shifted between her knees and gave her support, and his arm braced her sternum and kept her from listing. And she began to come down from it all - the storm, the card game, the too-bright laughter.

She settled out and settled in, and he began to whisper her stories into the shell of her ear, holding her.

we’re going to build a bigger hatch for the rabbits, Wyatt keeps setting them free but James will talk to him again and explain, Wolf won’t touch them this time if you say, there’s a stray on the place that they’re feeding, I’ll see about it, maybe it can be caught and taken to the vet but whatever the verdict we won’t put it down, I think James has it halfway claimed and it won’t be a problem, we’ll figure it out, the boys are happy you’re safe and they both said they love you though James was the one who was anxious for you to know, he wanted me to repeat it back to him like I didn’t get it down right the first time, ‘you’ll tell Mommy that I love her the most?’

She drifted to sleep like that, rocked by his words, and woke when the thunder crashed hard on the roof and shook the whole chicken coop like a fist. She gasped and startled in his arms, but he held her down and murmured the storm is all and she sank to her back and stared up at him in the pitch black until she could make out his features and no one else’s, not a trick, just him.

She gave a sharp cry and threw her arms around him, pressing him down against her, and he came, heavy and necessary, the scent of him filling her lungs.

You’re okay, it’s okay, just the thunder. And his kiss against her cheek, her throat, her nose felt like a man reassuring himself as well.

She clung to him, tossed upside down by circumstance and dreams, and eventually her heart rate slowed and her pulse stop jack-rabbiting. 

He was touching her. The curl of his fingers under her shirt and his palm hot against her stomach. He stroked softly, mindlessly, because it was always what had helped her in the past, only now he was doing it after more than twenty-four hours without it.

She came alive with the sensation of him, soft, gentle, tender. She was electric, gasping his name, and his fingers went still.

She cried out, clutched his wrist where he began to withdraw, shook her head in the pillow.

Please

He heard even if she hadn’t spoken, and while he stopped retreating from her, he didn’t caress, only kept his hand still at her stomach and waited.

“Not sex,” she husked. Her voice sounded like a scream had been dragged through it. “Just you.”

His arm curled under her head and brought her off the pillow, and he rolled to his back and put her over him. She fit awkwardly at first, but he cupped the back of her skull and pressed her down and she laid her cheek to his heart and felt it thump in her bones.

His fingers splayed under the collar of her henley and stroked softly, and his free hand rucked up the material of her shirt at her waist and came hot and wide to her back, pressing down.

She let out a long breath, shoulders rounding into his chest.

He traced a pattern on her back under her shirt, used his fingers and thumb, his whole hand, to touch her softly.

She felt like crying but didn’t, just closed her eyes and listened to the thunder rumble across the earth.

\----- 

It was somehow easier now to accept his hands on her, digging into her muscles and gliding oil across her skin. He pushed deep, made her groan, made her breath fall out of her lungs with his insistence, but it also worked the aches and spasms out of her muscles where it was most tender.

And once her back and shoulders were liquid relief against the sheets, Castle shifted to sit on the backs of her thighs to grip her ass.

She grunted at his first touch, bruised there where maybe something had torn or pulled in that formerly-tight ring of muscle. Tension crept back into her shoulders when he manipulated her cheeks, but he dug his thumbs into the hard knots of muscle and she cried out, trigger points releasing as her body jerked.

"There we go, that's it," he soothed, calling to her from where he had hunched over her body for the deepest pressure. "This will help, sweetheart. Can you relax? Deep breath and let it out."

She obeyed reflexively, sucking in a breath and letting it go with a shaky exhale, but she did it again, more purposefully, and some of the pain eased out with it. Castle's thumbs and fingers still dug in tight against her glutes, and every time he hit a bad spot, it spasmed and cramped before unknotting.

She breathed, her body faintly buzzing with that irritating arousal and then swinging wildly the other direction, reeling from pain, curling inward. He soothed and kept spreading the warming massage oil against her ass and flanks and thighs, over and over kneading deeper circles into those muscles.

After she had come down from that initial pain, the dull ache leftover was easy to accustom herself to, and she drifted once more. His hands manipulated and palmed and caressed and stroked, kneaded and massaged, digging pressure points out of her hamstrings that sent further relief to her ass. She was heavy-lidded and slack on top of the sheets when he first tried it.

His thumb between her cheeks. 

Her ass burned, tightening, a painful clutch and withdrawal from his foray that made her cry out.

"It's okay, it's okay, love. Did that on purpose to work those muscles. You're avoiding clenching because it hurts, those muscles were strained, but you need to, sweetheart. You need to clench down to work them back into shape." He was laid flat over her back, drawing his arms around her limp body. "Kinda blew them out taking you in the ass so many times without prep. But they tighten up again, you won't have any trouble, love, if you keep working them. Like any muscle, sweetheart, they can lose their tone and strength over time." He kissed the back of her neck, humming against her skin so that her whole body vibrated with it. "Are you as edged out as I am? I love your body, I love touching you all over, claiming every inch of skin and every secret place. Even the ones you don't."

She groaned, reaching back to grip his arm where it met his shoulder, digging her nails into his skin. "I'm - burning up."

"Me too," he husked. "Torture, loving you so damn much but being unable to have you."

She whimpered and buried her face in her pillow, his body on top of hers and pressing out her breath. It was a struggle just to draw air back into her lungs, but he seemed to want to be sure she struggled.

"I love you, Kate, and it's so good to have you. But this has taught me something I hadn't expected."

She shivered, but his mouth opened at her jaw and his tongue curled, making her whimper.

"It's so good to hold you," he rumbled. "Will you let me hold you? For as long as you can, as the night will let us, I want you pressed right up against me where I get a good grip."

She mewled, squirming under him, and he gave a lust-sad sigh, his breath hot against her neck.

"Your breasts, fuck, I love your breasts. You know that was the first thing - no, shit, not the very first. The first was you, yourself, pressed up against my own head like a thumbprint. I could feel every whorl and ridge of you inside me and I'd only just opened a door."

She took a shaky breath, still clutching his arm where he had a stranglehold on her neck and shoulders. He had told this story so many times it was comforting, like a bedtime story for the boys. She turned her head and put her lips to his bicep, sheathed her teeth.

"How you pushed inside me," he husked. "Isn't it erotic when you think of it like that?"

"Oh God," she whispered. That was not part of the story.

"Would you like to?" he hummed. "Push inside me like I did to you."

She shifted in his grip, just enough that now she could breathe with one lung at least. "I already have," she told him. "I use my thumb, my fingers, when-"

"Fuck," he growled, his forehead crashing into the back of her head. "I meant - with a tool. Something with a longer reach. An encounter where specifically all you'd be doing is penetrating me."

"Your ass," she clarified.

He chuckled and his face dropped next to hers, his cheek pressing down hard into hers so that she closed her eyes in the nearest thing she got to bliss when she wasn't being fucked. 

He shifted fully to his side and dragged the quilt up over their bodies, trapping in their heat. His whole form was molded to hers still, his bicep had replaced her pillow.

"My ass. But I mean, you can wear a strap on, it's double sided, so it penetrates you every time you penetrate me."

"Oh, God," she gasped, hips bucking at the image. Her core contracted involuntarily, and so did her ass, and she groaned, legs jerking inward.

"Yeah, that's it, sweetheart." He rubbed his scruff against the top of her shoulder. "Didn't that hurt less now than before? When you tightened up."

"Yeah," she rasped. But she was shaking. "I can - there's something I can wear inside me and we'd be fucking ourselves on it?"

"You'd be fucking me, sweetheart."

She was shaking. "I want to do that." She tightened her grip on his arm and tried to keep breathing. "Rick. I want that. So badly."

"I know, sweetheart, I know, baby. We will. Tighten up for me again, love."

She whined in frustration, but she contracted her inward muscles and her ass as well, grunting at the sharp pain that quickly diffused into dull ache once more.

"Better, that's better, right, sweetheart? We'll work on it later. Keep you nice and tight for me."

She groaned, bared her teeth to his arm and sank into his muscle, biting down hard.

He flexed twice under her mouth and growled fuck me in her ear, gripped her knee where she had unconsciously tried to part her legs for him. "Steady, love, not tonight. Penance." 

She was sure as fuck feeling it.

\-----


	19. Chapter 19

Kate wasn’t anywhere close to sleep, but it was nice like this. Well, after it was intensely erotically painful, then it was nice, pressed against her, one of his legs thrown over both of hers to keep her down. She had always felt more secure that way, and as he’d said, he really enjoyed holding her.

“You’re not sleepy?”

She huffed. “Are you?”

“No. But I’m full up on sleep.”

She squirmed, but he had the feeling it was just to make him feel it. “I’m not. But.” She shrugged.

“You’re a habitual insomniac is what you are.”

She smiled against his arm, and he flexed his muscles again until she chuckled. “Mm, you could say that. Just. Kinda nice to drift.”

“Yeah,” he murmured, smiling himself. “Feels good.” He hesitated, stroked his hand down her hair to push it away from his face. His scruff was thick now; he ought to shave but he didn’t want to move. “Did you... want to call the boys?”

“It’s late.”

“It’s only ten. They’re like you, night owls.”

She shifted, half-turned to look back at him. Her eyes were dark and her face pale, but she set her jaw. “Yeah. Let’s call. Help me sit up.”

He swallowed, almost wishing he hadn’t mentioned it, but he sat up, unwinding his arms from her and shifting them both up against the headboard. Kate detached from him to sit on her own, smoothing the quilt over her thighs, and giving him an expectant look.

He turned and scooped the cell phone off the side table, came back to her already dialing. Kate was chewing on her bottom lip, but he reached out and tugged it from her teeth, leaned in to softly kiss her. “Courage, love-”

His call was answered. “Yo. What you need, Castle?”

“Hey,” he grinned, releasing Kate’s chin and settling at her side. “Boys awake?”

“Yeah. Shit. You know I don’t do bedtimes-”

“I know, you’re fine. Want to talk to them, say good night. That’ll get you guys going in the right direction.”

“Actually,” Colin hesitated. “How about I get them in bed right now with the promise of talking to Kate - you are calling so Kate can say good-night, right?”

“Yeah, that was the idea. Are they in pajamas?”

“No,” Colin said, and Castle could practically hear the wince. “Hey, little demons, listen up. Mom and Dad are on the phone, and-”

Castle heard the rowdy cheering and the bark of the wolf, the general pandemonium that happened at their house.

“Pipe down, you brats. You have to put on pjs and brush teeth to talk - whoa, whoa, whoa. Slow down. Assholes. Slow your rolls.”

Castle chuckled, glanced to Kate. She wasn’t laughing; but at least she wasn’t riddled with tension. “Colin’s trying to get them all herded upstairs, brush teeth and all that. He’s using some colorful language.”

“I bet.” She went to bite her lip again, but she stopped before he could chastise her for it. He was in that mode again, and it was difficult to stop telling her what to do. Kate shifted beside him (he knew she still ached) and suddenly tipped her cheek to his shoulder.

He lifted his arm and slid it around her, and she curled right up against his side (probably because this angle hurt a lot less, that pain in her ass).

“Stop smirking,” she muttered.

He laughed, Colin yelled something over the phone, sharp and growling, and then, “Here, talk to your father while I help Wy. Take the phone.”

“Daddy?”

“Hey, James.”

“Oh, I thought I was gonna get to talk to Mom.”

“You will. Are you in pajamas and teeth brushed and in bed?”

“Oh. No?”

“How is that a question, kiddo?”

Kate laughed, sliding her knee over his thigh. “Which one is that?”

“It’s James,” he said, glancing at her. Her lips were in that twitching smile.

“Is that Mom?”

“It’s Mom, but you’re not in bed yet.”

“Colin is helping Wyatt find his pajamas. I’m already in my pajamas.”

“Good boy. What about teeth brushed?”

“No,” James sighed, sounding forlorn.

“Buddy, you’re five years old. I know you know how to brush your teeth. Go for it, my man.”

“Oh. I can do that! Hang on, Daddy, I gotta go brush my teeth.”

“Wait, take the phone with you-” He cut off as the phone was dropped, hopefully on the rug in the boys’ room, nice and thick and fluffy. He groaned softly and Kate laughed, sliding her arm around his waist.

“James leave you hanging?”

“Must run in the family.”

She gasped and slapped his chest, lifting up to look at him, that old spark and glare in her eyes that made him grin in return. 

“Castle? You there.”

“Yeah, here. Sorry, I kinda nudged James into brushing his teeth.”

“No, we’re good. James is brushing his teeth, Wyatt is jumping around like a rabbit trying to pull his pants on.”

“Heh.”

“Wy, brush your teeth. You’ll be second after James since, whoa, seriously, James, slow down. You’re gonna break your neck.” A pause. “Shit. I sound like your dad, don’t I? Castle, this is all your fault. I sound like a dad. What the fuck is the world coming to? Yeah, yeah, James, stop looking at me like that. You hear both your parents say fuck a lot more than you hear me say it.”

“I’m gonna defend both of us here,” Castle inserted. “There’s no way both of us say fuck more than you do.”

“I’ll second that,” Kate said, loud enough for Colin to hear.

“Was that Kate?”

“Yeah, Kate’s on my side with this one.”

Colin’s voice lowered. “She okay then? I mean, that kinda sounds like you guys are steadied out.”

“Yeah, think so,” he said lightly, smiling to keep Kate from clueing in. “You’re probably right.”

“He’s not right,” she muttered. “Colin swears all the damn time.”

“She says you swear all the damn time.”

“Look who’s swearing now.”

Castle chuckled, lifting an eyebrow, skimmed his hand up Kate’s arm. Down again. Stroking softly. She was tucked into his side, kittening up to him, and while he liked it, it wasn’t her usual. Their usual. He needed to pay attention because they had two nights, and if he needed to, if she needed to, they’d stay longer.

“Daddy?”

“Oh, hey, James, did you finish brushing your teeth?”

“Yup, and I’m already in my bed and Wyatt’s not even close. I win.”

“Not a contest, James,” he said, and at the same time, he heard Colin call out, “Not a competition.”

“You always say that,” Kate murmured at his side. “You and Colin. It’s sweet.”

He glanced down at her but James was saying something in his ear, and he missed it. “James, what was that?”

“I said, can’t I talk to Mommy now?”

“Yeah, yeah, Dad’s worthless, I know. Here’s Mom.” He handed the phone down to her, even as she was frowning at him for that statement, but she took the phone.

Kate sat up a little, but this time she put her back to his chest and he looped both arms around her. Her head tilted back. “Hey, baby.”

He watched her listening to James, the tension in her shoulders that gradually began to relax. Even if she felt some kind of shame or embarrassment about running, if she felt (okay she did feel) guilty about taking a runner, talking to the boys couldn’t possibly allow her to hang on to that feeling.

The boys were hers. Her sons, yes, but more. Those two boys who were always on her side, who had fought for her. Yeah. Good medicine in the right places and times.

Kate turned her cheek to his collarbone, her body melting. “Yeah, baby, you’re right. That’s the best pizza.”

Castle grinned, chuckling to himself, combed down her hair from where it was sticking to his almost-beard. “Best pizza is Tony’s. Don’t let that boy fool you.”

“Daddy says it’s Tony’s. We’ll have to prove him and Wyatt, wrong, won’t we?”

“Never gonna happen.”

“Hush, I’m talking here. No, not you, Jay. Daddy keeps making comments. Right. He can’t help it.”

Castle grinned and laid his chin on top of Kate’s head, listened to the natural dialogue that always sprouted up between them. She might think she was bogus as a mom, but damn, she always impressed him. And the boys. A lot of adoration when it came to Kate.

He hoped she felt that.

\-----

"That's right, baby," she murmured softly. James's words had gotten progressively fewer and far between. "Hand Uncle Colin the phone so I can tell Wyatt good night too."

"'Kay, Mommy," James mumbled, and then gave a sharp yawn. "Did Daddy tell you I love you best? Supposed to tell you."

Her heart clenched and released, her breath somewhere caught in lungs that didn't seem to want to work.

"Mommy?" James, rousing, the rustle of bedding as he moved. 

"Yeah, he told me. Daddy told me. You know I love you, James."

"I know," he said simply, and then yawned again and he was gone. The phone being passed over.

"Hang on, kid, your turn is next."

She froze at the sound of Colin's voice.

"Kate?"

"I'm - here," she croaked.

“You are now,” Colin said. “And - standing in front of your kids, stuff I can’t say - but I’m glad you are. I’m glad you’re here. You understand?”

She gave out a shaky breath and Castle’s arm came tighter around her, though he couldn’t possibly have heard or even known. “I - yes. I do.”

“Good. Here’s the other brat.” 

“Mommy?” a little querulous voice. “That took so long.”

She laughed, a strangled sound in her throat.

“Mommy, what was that?”

“You made me laugh,” she got out, swiping under her eyes at stupid tears. “Just surprised me. It took so long because I love you both so much. But you get just as long as James, I promise.”

“Good,” he huffed. “And Tony’s is too the best.”

She laughed again, turning her body into Castle’s. She ached everywhere she moved, but sitting still in one position for too long made all new ones. “Daddy said the same. We’ll get pizza and stromboli when we come home, go to Tony’s and to Rainbow’s both. Have a taste test.”

“Cool!” She could hear Wyatt relaying that to his brother, and then his soft huff. “James is asleep.”

“I bet he is. How about you? You sleepy?”

“Nope. I’m up up up.”

“Even so, little turkey, lie down and have a soft voice, let James sleep if he can.”

“He never sleeps. I sleep good.”

“You usually do.” In fact she had been almost certain that Wyatt would’ve fallen asleep while waiting for his turn. But he hadn’t. “What did you do today, baby?”

“I don’t know. I played. We hunted down Wolf. But guess what?”

“What?”

“I’m all healed up, Mommy!” 

Her heart dropped.

“See? I told you. It don’t even hurt. And Wolf is in my bed with me and he keeps licking my arm like he’s saying he’s sorry.”

She took a fast breath. “Yeah, baby. I’m sorry too. You know I-”

“Why are you sorry? Wolf is the biter. He’s wild, Mommy. Daddy says you don’t tame wild things, you just love them.”

She turned her face into Castle, breathing hard, managed to get out some kind of affirmative to her son on the phone. Castle’s arm around her back, holding her against him, his chin at the top of her head and pointy, digging in. His chest, strong and hard and still soft and warm. All these points of contact, all these tethers to the world.

“So we said no and we got him meat from the deli, Mommy, and Colin said that would tide him over until you guys can go hunting. Do you eat it too?”

“Do I eat what?” she rasped, coming back to her son still chattering on the phone. “Oh, what Wolf hunts? No, baby, I don’t eat that. It’s not cooked.”

“But you won’t let him eat the rabbits.”

She sighed, sinking into Castle. “No, honey, I promise. Wolf doesn’t eat your rabbits.” He killed rabbits on their property, yes, but not Wyatt’s pets. Though Wolf had tried, more than twice, and Castle had thrown up his hands and moved them all down to the city.

They weren’t city people. None of them. Wyatt wanted his animals and James wanted his woods, and they just didn’t fit.

Kate couldn’t stand the buildings, the noises, the people - all the things she’d grown up with, had been raised on, fed like milk from the breast. She couldn’t do it. That wasn’t her any longer. She didn’t belong.

And so she had run. To destruction. To be annihilated. To the city with its blood-soaked arms and its knives and death.

But he had taken her there, all of them, to begin with.

“I named him Rogers. Colin said that was an old man’s name who wanted to be my neighbor, but I don’t know what he means. Rogers is a good name for a grey bunny, right Mommy?”

“Yeah, baby. Rogers is a great name. How many grey bunnies do you have now? And where are you keeping them?”

“Colin fixed the hutch,” Wyatt said with relish. “And Mommy there’s a dog.”

“There’s a - what? Oh, you mean the stray you guys are feeding?”

Wyatt squeaked. “Did Colin tell you?”

“No,” she laughed. “No, baby, Daddy told me. I guess Colin or James told him. You can feed him, Wyatt. That’s okay. But you just have to be careful about what other wild things you’re feeding.”

“It’s a girl.”

“What’s-”

“Dog is a girl dog.”

“How do you know?”

“I know.”

She lifted her chin and saw Castle studying her. “Dog is a girl?” she asked him.

He shrugged.

“Yeah, Mommy, we feed her.”

“Okay, okay, well... careful of Dog and Wolf, honey. That could be - um - interesting.”

“Wolf is licking me again,” Wyatt giggled. “Stop, stop, Wolf. I’m okay. Not even a scar. I’m super like Daddy.”

Her breath caught.

Wyatt was giggling those happy, tired sounds, a little hysterical with his exhaustion. He was rambling in her ear or talking to Wolf; it was hard to know. “Mommy made me. I’m as strong as Mommy.”

“What, baby?” she whispered. 

A long exhalation of relief and tiredness. A flop as she imagined Wyatt turning over onto his pillow. “Love you, Mommy. I’m gettin’ tired now.”

“I can hear. Love you back, my little ghost.”

“Tell Daddy...”

“What am I supposed to tell him?” she said softly, but Wyatt didn’t answer. She guessed he’d already fallen asleep.

She lowered the phone from her ear, it was hot and burning, and she glanced up at Castle.

“Wyatt says I love you.”

Castle took the phone from her fingers. Delicately. His eyes were tender, so much that it made her want to cry.

He leaned in and brushed his lips to hers, breathing against her mouth as he withdrew an inch. “Love you too, Wyatt.”

She whimpered and wound her arms around his neck, dragged herself over into his lap, clinging to him.

\-----

“Talk to me, baby.” He rubbed her back, untangling the hair that straggled out of her pony tail. And finally he undid it entirely, combing the wavy and tangled strands as she tried not to cry. “Kate. You gotta talk. Start with the boys, work from there.”

She nodded against his neck; he felt the tears at his skin but he ignored them. Stroked his fingers through her hair until she unwound an arm from his neck and drew down to press her palm to his heart.

“I can hear you,” she murmured, “in everything they say. Every beautiful, sweet thing they say to me. It’s you.”

He wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not, but she tucked her face in against his bare skin and let out a sighing breath. He didn’t know what she wanted to hear, but hesitation on his part had always been the wrong course. So he plunged into it. “If those rowdy boys are saying beautiful or sweet things to you, it’s only because they see what I see.”

She sobbed.

“Shit,” he croaked, wrapping both arms around her now, shifting his legs up to press his whole body into hers. “Baby, what’s this about?”

“How-” She growled and bared her teeth against his shoulder, pulling her arms into her chest. He stayed quiet while she swiped at her cheeks, sucking in breaths that thankfully seemed easier than a panic-attack-induced crying jag. It wasn’t that, but he didn’t know what it was.

And he’d never been good with quiet, so while she got herself together, he offered what he could. “Maybe it is me. Maybe they’re just parroting the things I say. But that doesn’t make it not true. And they wouldn’t say it if they didn’t believe it themselves. Maybe other kids - I don’t know - maybe regular kids say shit all the time, but our kids know better. They feel us as we feel them; you know that. How fucking hard is it to hide Christmas presents from James?”

She laughed, gasping against his chest. He let his arms loosen a little to give her space if she needed it, kissed the side of her face.

“They wouldn’t say sweet things if they didn’t mean them.”

“I know they - do,” she husked. “But they’re - your words.” She caught his hand and dragged his arm in against her chest, her lips against his knuckles. “I hear you in everything they say, all those wonderful things, and you - somehow you see me like that.”

He sighed and nudged his cheek against hers. Her tears to his skin. She kissed his knuckles and laid her head against his hand as if she couldn’t keep herself upright any longer.

“You know how I see you,” he murmured. If he sighed, if it was a hundred times a day he had to explain, again and again, he would damn well do it. “You were there. Standing over his body, blood splattered against your neck, soaking that flimsy hospital top, ready to take on any damn thing that came. My salvation.”

She shuddered.

“I know that’s not your favorite, and it’s - probably one of the worst memories you have-”

“There are worse,” she husked.

He swallowed, bowed his head into her. “Yeah, that was a stupid ass thing to say.”

“No. Bad enough.”

“Still I - that’s one of my best,” he rasped. “As fucked up as that is. I’m sorry. But - I’m not sorry. I’m not. I hold that image close, protect it. They day I met you, the moment I knew the whole purpose of my life.”

“Rick,” she moaned.

“To be yours,” he finished. “I won’t stop saying it. I won’t. You cannot make me stop wanting to be yours in every way-”

“I know,” she gasped, twisting in his arms. She flung herself against him, one of her legs wrapping around his and tangling. “I know it.”

“You just don’t think I should,” he sighed.

“I...” She clutched him. “I want you too. I want - you to have so much more than me. What you deserve-”

“Please stop,” he groaned, gripping the back of her neck. “Please stop devaluing yourself. And me in that. If you think so little of me-”

“No,” she gasped. “No, you’re - exactly perfect. I - I don’t know. I don’t know why I can’t-”

“Okay,” he said, trying to keep them from derailing again. “Issues, right? We can work on that in therapy. But it doesn’t make it not true. That I love you, that you’re my - you’ve made my life.”  
“All these issues,” she groaned. “I’ll never see clear-”

“So?” he growled. He was holding her too tight, and he knew it, but he couldn’t let go. “What the fuck does it matter? Everyone has issues. Everyone. I spent a whole fucking lifetime having nothing at all, no issues, no problems, because I did nothing. It’s not cleaner, it’s not better, it’s nothing.”

She nodded against his neck. She did, he thought, at least believe him.

“You gotta tell me when things aren’t going right, when issues become suffocating, Kate. You gotta tell me shit like you can’t do the city. I don’t fucking need the city; I don’t even want it. I just figured you’d want to be close to your parents.”

“My parents aren’t there. My parents are dead.”

He swallowed, fingers sinking into her hair. “I - yeah. I don’t know what I was thinking, except that you deserve more. God. You deserve so much more than being hidden away in-”

“I feel safe,” she whispered. Her chin lifted and her eyes met his, strong. “I feel safe there. You don’t seem to realize how precious little makes me feel safe when you’re gone.”

“I make you feel safe?” He stared down at her, astonished.

She laughed, shifted in his lap to wind her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist. “You make me feel... I can do anything.”

“And so you moved to the city.”

“Yeah,” she sighed. Her skin to his, her body. He tightened his arms around her and pressed his cheek to hers because he loved her. He just - it was steady, a flame, but it was, at this moment, more of a wave, crashing over him.

She hummed, drew her arms in until her hands framed his face. Her fingers in his hair, scratching at his nape, she kissed him.

“I can’t live in that city,” she murmured at his lips. “I can’t walk those same streets and pretend that every time I see all those old places it doesn’t rip out my insides, that it doesn’t remind me of how fucked up everything got. I don’t want it. I want the woods, and that beautiful fortress you made for me even without knowing it was for me. I want the rabbit hutch and the river and Wolf’s muddy prints and having to yell upstairs to the boys to shut up and making love to you in the shed just to get away from everyone-”

He growled and kissed her hard, bringing her hips in against his groin so that she mewled, pain and pleasure. Her tongue was voracious, her style completely naive, but so enthusiastic, so much in love that it was everything.

She broke away first, breathing hard and staring heavy-lidded at him. She licked her lips and traced her thumb against his top lip. “When I’m with you, it’s not constant reminders that everything got fucked, that I got fucked. When I’m moving, doing, when I can focus on anything else - school or the rabbits or the boys or you - I just - I can be me. Issues, yeah, but the closest I ever get to Kate again.”

Something so fierce in her face as she said it, as if daring him to argue.

He shook his head. “You’re gonna be such a fucking awesome covert agent. You will absolutely slay it.”

She glowed, her eyes lighting up. “That’s - that’s where I can be most myself. When I’m the least me.”

\-----


	20. Chapter 20

“Go,” she said, pushing at his thigh with her feet. “You need more than some peanut butter crackers, Castle. I’m okay right now. I’ll make it the five feet you have to walk to the kitchenette.”

He grimaced and shook his head, but he was standing. “I - was thinking real food. Not that peanut butter isn’t real food, but we can hit a drive thru somewhere. Few miles back. Go in your pajamas.”

“Requires putting pajamas actually on,” she muttered, but she tested her body, pushing upright. “Yeah.”

“Really? Because I don’t - I am not leaving you here alone. I will down the rest of that peanut butter if I have to.”

“No,” she said, leaning forward to see how bad it was. She could do it. “No, a drive will be nice. Be on the move. You know I need forward momentum. Is it still storming?”

“Just a little rain,” he said, even as lightning licked outside the windows.

She cracked up, laughing at him, and he huffed at her, shrugging his shoulders. She put her feet to the floor and held her hands out. “Sure, baby. Just a little.”

“Don’t think you get to be all condescending now, Kate Beckett.” But he took her hands and hauled her to her feet. “You’re still mine.”

She bumped hips with him, mostly on accident as she reclaimed her balance, but she lifted her head. “Better be,” she husked, and he came down to kiss her, just as she wanted.

Oh, she had him even as he had her. It made her warm all through her abused body, and even better because the abuse was his, for him, was her worthless self remade for exactly what he’d wanted. For once.

She flushed when he lifted his lips from hers, his eyes studying her. He touched a hank of her hair and pushed it behind her ear. “I know what you’re thinking about,” he murmured. “How you were such a wanton, wild thing for me.”

She was crimson to her toes. Not shame, but lust. Absolute pure and raw lust for him, for the ways he’d made her wild, wild not because she couldn’t handle life, but wild because he was all-consuming.

“I love you,” she choked out, caught by it, all the rich feeling of want and desire that she had used to pretend was only primitive animal need. Fuck, the look on his face as she came up on her toes and pressed their bodies together, gripping him with all the fierceness in her. “I know I’m saying it too much-”

“God, no,” he cried out, grabbing her. “Don’t you dare censor yourself now.”

She laughed desperately, kissing his cheek, biting the short bristles until he growled. But he didn’t shove her back on the bed and unzip his pants, which was their usual, he just squeezed her tighter and nipped at her neck until she felt her skin break.

She shivered and clung, realized she was clinging and made herself stop, made herself draw her arms back. Still he kept her, arms around her tightly, his lips first against her cheek, then her nose, then her eyelid, making her close her eyes.

“I adore hearing it come choked up out of your mouth, like you can’t help yourself, like it wants out despite you. Like it’s been that way all along, and all those noises you’ve made, all the times you whimpered moaned growled mewled at me, it was really-”

She groaned, laughing against him, pushing him off her. “Get dressed. You’re hunger-starved delirium is adorable but probably not good for us in the long run.”

He was grinning. He kissed her once more, a resounding smack on the lips, and then stepped back to grab clothes off the floor. 

Now she had to face a drive-thru window. She could do that.

\-----

She was in her pajamas, technically, though the yoga pants and henley and the fleece pull over were all things she’d worn all day anyway. She had on the thick wool socks shoved into boots she didn’t remember him buying, and the heater was turned on high for her sake. So was the radio, and the constant guitar and drum solos were nicely mindless.

Castle drove them back into the little highway town with one hand on her knee where her leg was pulled up in the seat and arrowed towards him. He rubbed his thumb over her knee and then wormed in between the folds of skin where her knee was bent, stayed there. She gave him a sidelong look, driving one-handed in some severe weather, but he was completely at ease.

James did that, sought out the full pressure of her body around his, either her arms encompassing him or tunneling into the space between her back and the couch cushions, wanting to be squished. She had thought that was her thing, her issues or needing to be contained, but she wasn’t sure now. Castle did it a lot to her; he’d been the one who had curled up at her back and then buried himself in her body, arms under her, or his legs tangled, and it had become a thing she’d needed to feel he was safe from her reach, so smothered was she.

But she wasn’t - when he was gone, fuck, she slept sprawled over the whole bed and never woke in the middle of the night, and maybe she didn’t like to be contained, naturally, unless it was that necessary containment so she wouldn’t dream and do something bad to him again.

(She hadn’t, actually, since that first time. Therapy had worked, talking, having control over her own decisions and access to resources or weapons. And shit, going to school, finishing up her degree online with a few community courses had really done a lot for her sense of agency, for being confident that asserting herself wouldn’t immediately jeopardize herself or others, that making a choice wasn’t actually aggressive but only natural. She hadn’t hurt anyone who hadn’t deserved it; she had fought for herself in many spheres, and only in physical combat had she done damage and it had all been justifiable. If slightly extreme.)

“You’re thinking a little too hard over there. Wanna share, baby?”

She huffed and tilted towards him, wrapping her fingers around his wrist to keep him there. “Just shifting,” she murmured when he tried to withdraw his hand. She held on. “My glutes are bruised, I think, from that massage. But a good way, sweetheart, it’s good.”

He made a noncommittal noise and she realized she’d deflected the question, tried to go back to it.

“I’ll share. What I’m thinking is just - how I ought to be naturally, without interference, versus what I am after - everything that happened. I used to think there wasn’t a difference, that he hadn’t changed me at my core. Does that make sense?”

“Your core personality, yeah, I get that. Because it was only three years and you’d already grown up.”

She sighed. “I was nineteen. And the older I get, the more I realize that’s shit, thinking he didn’t alter me.”

“Still, at your core, sweetheart, you’re you, even if habits and PTSD and all that shit change your behaviors.”

“Aren’t I my behaviors?”

“No.” He squeezed her leg. “Believe me, I know what it is to be the sum total of only your behaviors. Sum total, Beckett. That was me. Nothing went on past that.”

“I don’t believe that. You had Colin-”

“Duty. Loyalty. Maybe a lingering sense that I had to be responsible for him, or maybe even to him. But I’m not sure how much of that was bred in us as soldiers responsible for our unit. I can’t take the credit for having that duty all my own.”

“Alex and Ben didn’t seem to have that duty.”

“To each other, to an extent,” he said. He had to pitch his voice for her to hear him above the thunder. “But it was trained in us. And at base, he was working with some shit material, his own fucking genetics and whatever woman he’d-” Castle fell off, shook his head. “I’m damn lucky it was you.”

He was lucky she had been taken, primed, impregnated. “Well, thanks.”

Castle cleared his throat, opened his mouth, but fell silent.

She worried the white thread he wore around his wrist, studying it as she got herself back together. The thread reminded her, the oath he’d taken, the vows she had wanted to take a few nights ago, and just how far from that state she really was.

“I’m sorry,” he said roughly, his fingers now gripping her shin and calf where his hand dug into the space where her knee was bent. “I’m sorry it was you. But I’m lucky it was you; they’re lucky it was you. Those boys are better men than I’ll ever be, because you’re their mother.”

She tilted her head back against the headrest and watched the rain pound against the windshield. “I know what you meant. I just - who was I before, and what would I have been, and how do I reclaim any of that now? Impossible.”

“It’s not,” he husked. “You’re not just your behaviors, that’s what I’m telling you. Just - why do you love strawberry milkshakes so much, sweetheart? Why do you always come up with the perfect solutions to our tactical issues or to the boys’ arguments? There are things about you that don’t have anything to do with being imprisoned for three years by a fucking sadist.”

“Well it certainly made me a masochist.”

“I highly doubt that you weren’t, somewhere in there, already.” 

She gaped at him, jaw dropping, and he shrugged, mouth set.

“Castle.”

“I won’t take it back. You really fucking crave it.”

She turned her face front, gritted her teeth.

“It’s not bad, Kate. If I thought it was bad, I wouldn’t have done it to you, would I? You need it, and more than that, it tells you something about me, about my faithfulness to you, that you need. And yeah, maybe that part is because of how we both have been fucked up, but the underlying root cause isn’t some asshole who made us hurt.”

She swallowed, squirming on the seat. She didn’t - want to talk about why she craved being used by him. By him. “You’re the only one I’d ever-”

“If you say allow, I will shake you. I’m the only one with whom you enjoy it, Kate, want it, and there’s a difference between who you allow and who you want.”

Kate let out a hard breath, stunned.

“You allowed that asshole at the bar to use you pretty rough, and I’m not sure how much consent was actually given for some of it, considering how fucking plastered you were. But that’s been dealt with. I bring it up only because allow is what happens when your behavior, your self, is acting on that fucked up part.”

Kate blinked. “Oh. I-” She glanced at him quickly, just to be absolutely sure he wasn’t furious right now, and he really wasn’t. His eye didn’t twitch, his jaw was relaxed; he wasn’t angry. He was just trying to talk it out. “I want you,” she husked. “No one else can use me like you do and all I want is more.”

“I know,” he said simply, a sidelong look as he navigated the Subaru through the downpour. “And that comes from that core, inviolate part of you, of us, baby. I’ve thought about this inside and out, wrestling with it for - years now. The ways I want to claim you, and how very damn much I won’t be him, how I denied an essential part of my being in this misguided attempt to block out all of those feelings, and in doing so, I denied you. I never want to do that, and yet I did, I denied you, you, and it put your feet on this path, baby.”

She tangled her fingers in the white thread, tugging, tugging, and still it didn’t break. The oath he’d sworn had always held fast, and she had really thought to break it this time and maybe he’d finally be safe from her.

But they weren’t safe from each other. She hurt him, he hurt her, that was just living, and at least together they were so much stronger. She might still hurt him in irrevocable ways, but this thread between them still held.

(She had no idea why this damn bit of a hospital bedsheet never broke, this white thread that seemed so soft and yet would have to be fucking cut off him to remove it.)

“Kate? Can you forgive me for that? Denying both of us the opportunity to have such - there’s such intimacy in it. So much more that I hadn’t realized we weren’t getting to have before-”

“Of course I forgive you,” she husked, leaning sideways to press herself against his arm. His grip behind her knee slacked and she dragged his hand up, between her legs, grinding her hips against him. “Of course, of course, can you ever forgive-”

“Already done, and you know it,” he said thickly. His hand fisted between her legs and knuckled into her. She cried out, gasping, her head falling back to the seat and as raw agony chased the pleasure that shivered through her body. “Not yet, not right now,” he was saying. “Not tonight.”

She whimpered, shaking now in that strange letdown of relief and adrenaline-soaked pain, her palms clammy, sweat pricking her scalp.

He smoothed out his hand and gripped her behind the knee once more, and she quaked in the seat, catching her breath.

She couldn’t help thinking about what he’d said about the inviolate parts of her. The core of her who craved Rick Castle’s body taking hers, his soul taking hers, those inviolate parts actually meeting and abrading one another.

In another life, the one she hadn’t gotten, would she have him? Would she know, at all, the depth of such a connection, the absolute rock solid love?

The oath of his heart and the devotion that were hers to do as she willed with them.

She couldn’t possibly. It required this to have that. 

Her pain was necessary to her greatest joy.

\-----

Castle idled in the drive-thru of a home-cooked Southern style restaurant, the last car in a long line. Kate had been quiet for the rest of the drive and so the thunderstorm had loomed large in the spaces between, thunder booming, the wind knocking into the Subaru, the tires on the wet pavement, the ever-steady drumbeat of the rain’s dissonance to the radio’s music.

She had turned it down when they’d pulled in. Shook her head when he asked if she wanted anything. He was going for grilled chicken, brown rice, bland stuff, hoping she’d nibble, and he’d buy a thing of rolls for later, for if she could, for peanut butter in the morning maybe.

She turned towards him in the darkness, the green glow of the dash lights on her face, and she curled her fingers in and around his oath-thread. “You didn’t set my feet on this path.”

He studied her. “I didn’t?”

“No,” she said. She shook her head slowly, fingers torquing the thread. “You didn’t deny me. I don’t know about denying yourself, that could be true-”

“It is,” he said heavily. How he’d ached to fucking put her in her place, where she belonged, the dreams he’d had at night when it was the worst, usually after something like this.

She sighed, gave him a look for interrupting her, and he mimed locking his lips and throwing away the key.

Her eyebrow quirked at him.

He put his hand back in his lap, mimicking Wyatt’s I’m a good boy look.

She huffed, a little laughter, but he saw she wouldn’t be derailed. “You didn’t deny me. You sheltered me. From myself, from my panic attacks, from my brokenness. Making love to you has always been about safe haven, Rick, and I’m one hundred percent sure I couldn’t have held up under last night without - without this kind of thing behind it.”

He swallowed hard, stomach churning at the thought of how easily he could’ve picked the wrong time, even now, had she not been ready, had it not been something she could take even if she’d wanted to.

“It had to be about me needing penance, seeking propitiation for transgressing such a serious - a sacred thing. I hold us sacred, Castle, don’t you?”

“Yes,” he said, without hesitation. “You know I do. My worship-”

“Mine too,” she insisted. “There’s this story, you know, about some religion choosing a goat and symbolically heaping the sins of the whole people on it and then casting it out of their camp, to the outer darkness, to the place of exile where they burned their trash. Hell.”

He studied her, not understanding.

She curled her fingers through the oath-thread. “But I don’t have a goat, and if I did, I certainly wouldn’t place my sins on it. Wyatt would pitch a fit.” He laughed and her lips flickered in a smile. “But I get why, and I feel why. There has to be a way to make payment-”

“Don’t you dare start with-”

“Not this,” she husked, fingers tightening in the cord until it cut into his wrist. “I don’t mean this. It’s not obligation or whoredom. It’s the opposite. It’s restitution for violating this oath.”

“You didn’t make it. And how is what you did go against my oath to you never to use love against you?”

She let out a little noise and shook her head. “It’s your oath to love me, without sex if I needed it, without love in return, and I soiled that. I made it unclean. I-”

“Stop, no.”

“You know I did.”

“But we are past it now. That’s over. We fixed that-”

“Nothing like that can be fixed, Castle. We started the work of me - shit - putting my sins off onto the goat. Penance.”

“The goat isn’t punishment, Becks.” He shook his head and then his arm where she was still tightening her fingers in the thread. “This oath isn’t punishment or even a tie that binds you-”

“I want to be bound.”

He studied her carefully, truth or wishful thinking or hope, and he couldn’t decide which it was. “Alright. I know you do. You asked me to marry you.”

She turned crimson, darted her eyes away. “You said no.”

“I said not for this.”

She let out a harsh noise from her throat, eyes still away from him. He crept forward in the drive thru line, one-handed as she still had his thread-bound wrist, and then he put on the parking break and turned back to her.

“Not for this, Kate. Don’t start a marriage to me in goat-sin and propitiation. Don’t bind yourself to me from obligation.”

“It’s not-” she cried out but halted, lips falling mute.

“I know what it is, sweetheart. Just as you knew what this was. It’s not obligation, but I am bound. I never wanted to cage you, but you’re bound too.”

She let out a shaky breath, pressed her free hand into her eyes. “Then what - how in the world do you ever expect-” She growled. “You don’t want to marry me?”

“I want to marry you. Not the goat.”

She actually laughed at that, a strangled thing in her chest, but her eyes turned swiftly back to him. “I think that’s gotten a little corrupted.”

“Alright, then, I don’t want marrying you to be the goat you feel is necessary so you can feel forgiven. I forgive you, your sins are washed away. White as snow, love. And no, I’m not a good god, baby, because it’s not easy and those sins aren’t forgotten. They have consequences for us both I can’t erase, but that damn goat-marriage can’t erase them either. It will only make it worse. And fuck me, I’d give anything not to make it worse for you, including that dream.”

She chewed on her bottom lip, mouth twisted, eyes roaming his face. “I want to want to marry you.”

“Thanks, sweetheart.” But damn if that didn’t hurt worse than hearing her say it as she sobbed for forgiveness. He wished he could say, let’s drop this, but this was therapy for her. This was how they worked that out, how she discovered all that fucked up shit still in her own head, and this was why she needed a real therapist.

She could say this shit to a real therapist and he wouldn’t have to hear it; she wouldn’t have to watch him hear it.

“You deserve better than me,” she husked.

“No,” he said, shaking his head as he turned to her. “I deserve exactly you.”

She pressed her lips flat, moved to shake her head, but he twisted his hand in her grip and pinched the nerve in the webbing of her thumb. She froze.

“Listen to me,” he rasped. “Listen to me and hear me this time. You were there last night. That’s who I am. That’s who I’ve been for thirty years before you. I slaughtered children with their mothers because it was the easiest way to assassinate their fathers.” She jerked her head to one side and he reached up, grabbed the side of her face, made her. “Look at me. It’s not pretty or good. My soul is Black. That is who made me.” He was struggling now to keep the grief off his own face, though he couldn’t keep it out of his voice. “And while you were being abused, your body not your own, while he fucked you over, I didn’t just do nothing, I did all I could for him. Death. Destruction. Annihilation. It is only by the grace of a god I don’t believe in that it wasn’t me who murdered your mother or silenced your father.” She gasped, shutting her eyes to him. “That is who I am. I deserve you. Don’t take from me my only hope of salvation.”

And as brutal a light as it painted her, for all the shit she had done to him, it was also the only way to make her see, clearly, that if anything he was the one stained and sinned, and he had no sacrifice to make him clean, no hope for it either - without her.

\-----

She got it and she didn’t. She felt the same as him, but she couldn’t understand how that feeling she had for him could be mirrored in his feeling for her. She was still mired in worthlessness, and she didn’t know how to come back from that, how to drag herself back to the ledge of confidence in her abilities and surety in her being, not after this.

She had, after all, burned her bridges. She had not been able to make a clean break of it, but the messy and ragged break might kill her in the long run.

She used to feel - if not worth it, then at least working to be worth it. Now all those routes towards working for it felt closed to her, felt out of her league, out of her reach. She-

“If you don’t stop thinking like that, I will fuck you into submission tonight,” he growled.

Her heart stopped.

His hand caught hers and dragged her towards him by her arm, so that she fell against the center console hard, her ribs smacking the contoured plastic, and then his mouth was at her ear with the rain pounding on the roof.

“I will do whatever it takes to drive the poison from your soul. I will beat the shit out of you if that’s what it takes. There are instruments of torture we never even touched on, love, and I will put you in the hospital if I have to.”

“Fuck,” she croaked, flooded with an arousal so keen and a fear so intense it closed up her throat.

“Don’t think I don’t understand what it takes to love you. Love is not easy. It’s work. Are you going to stop feeling sorry for yourself and what you did, and actually do the fucking work or are you going to give up. After everything.”

“No,” she choked out, shaking her head and smacking her cheek against his chin. “No, I’m not - I won’t stop. I can’t. I tried to but it made everything wrecked-”

“Then do not step willfully down into your spiral. You are not your own; you’ve been bought with a price. You’re mine.”

She sucked in a hard breath of air, still skittering from I will put you in the hospital and trying without much success to reel herself back from the edge. 

He pushed her hand to his groin and she groaned, the throbbing heat of him through his pants like a brand. “Castle,” she husked. “Oh God. I-”

“Your mouth. Right now. Take me out.”

Her thoughts ceased entirely, her body collapsing down towards his lap. Her hands shook as she unbuttoned his pants, tugged at his zipper, his hips already restless in the seat. Thunder crashed as she reached in for him and they both jumped, and he growled her name at her pause so that she jerked forward and scraped his cock with her nails.

“Shit,” he hissed. “Shit, Kate.”

She cleared him from his boxers and pants so that his erection rose like a snake in the darkness, seeking her mouth. She braced herself on his thigh and lowered her head, opening her mouth for him.

“Fuck,” he groaned, the sound dredged from the deepest places. His hands gripped her hand, a fistful of her hair, tightening so that she felt her skull shifting.

She licked a long circuit around the head of his cock, tasted his fluid on her tongue. He was breathing harshly in the dim interior, the rain a sheet on the windshield, the windows, veiling them. She tongued the slit at his head and he yelped, hips rising, forcing more of his cock into her mouth.

She swallowed and pushed herself down until his cock nudged the back of her throat, came back up as she hollowed her cheeks. He was restless now and whining her name, some of the darkness gone from his voice but another layer added to it that she couldn’t identify. She squeezed the base of his cock and reached in for his sac, fondled his balls as she went down on him.

“Oh, fuck,” he gasped.

It was all the warning she had. He came in a spectacular display inside her mouth, down her throat, the bitter-salt taste of his come filling her so that she didn’t swallow so much as inhale. She was choking on him, sucking him through his dragged out orgasm, every wave of his seed as it left his cock pulled hungrily down her throat until he was sated.

His fingers swiped at her mouth, even as she loosened her lips and let him slide out. She sucked on his thumb and cleaned down to his palm with her tongue, and then he gripped her by the back of her neck as she did the same to the head of his cock, little sharp darts of pleasure contracting inside her.

As painful and cramped as it was, she kept her head on his thigh and closed her eyes, her body torqued over the center console and her ribs bruised. His hand, heavy on her neck, petted awkwardly, clumsily, as he regained his senses.

“Gonna have to do that again,” he groaned. “When we get back.”

She nodded, her hand cradling his cock now, already cognizant of the way it was stirring for her, trying.

“I don’t care about what we deserve, if I’m worth it, if you’re worth it. This is too good, too vital for me,” he husked. His voice was like sandpaper. 

She traced the ridge in his cock with a finger, the same spot she always liked to touch with her tongue. Like a divot, a place where it wasn’t regular. A reminder that it wasn’t about perfection, but that it was actually about all these incongruities.

“You can’t decide for me that I don’t get to have you. You can’t leave because you think I’m better off without you. I’m not. You might not believe it, but you don’t get to enforce your fucked up beliefs on me. You don’t get to make that decision.”

He growled a curse, gripping the back of her neck.

“Sit up, Kate. Crawl into my lap for a second, I need you close.”

She scrambled up, wincing as her ribs shifted in the bruised places, but she unthreaded the seatbelt from her hips where it had caught her and crawled into his lap. He clung to her, kissed her mouth while she was still breathless, his tongue ravaging.

He broke off only to press his forehead to hers. She heard grief in his voice when he spoke, desperation. “I can’t make you believe me. So you’re just gonna have to go on faith here, love. You’re just going to have to decide to be with me no matter what happens. And I know your own head tells you wrong shit, I know it’s hard to make that leap with all the negative still buried in you like land mines, but you’re mine. I can take it, I will fucking take it. It’s not about deserve. It’s not about being worth it. Just be grateful for it, be so fucking grateful for me that you stay.”

She slid her arms around his neck and squeezed, but she was already in that space where shut down was likely, where the things he said sank right into her without her knowing or apprehending. There was no thinking, but there was no turbulence either.

“I love you with all of my being, Kate Beckett. I want your body, but I want your fucked up soul too. Last night, it was mine, it was mine, and I will take it again and again out of your own reach until - forever.” His hands were everywhere, squeezing her breasts, pressing their hips together, her ass, her hair, her thighs. “Fuck, I want you again. So badly. I can feel you drifting, feel the way you shut down, and I want you here.”

She cried out, his fingers suddenly inside her panties, inside her. Her knee came up, smashed into the steering wheel, but he hissed promises and stay right there, like that, yes baby until she was trembling, breaking, coming apart around his fingers and sobbing his name as the agony ripped her open and spilled her out.

He cradled her, kissed her face, her neck, calling her name until she could breathe, until she could open her eyes.

And then a long angry horn sounded from behind them and he swore, swore again. “Damn it, the line. Shit. Hang on, let me put it in gear.”  
And they rocketed forward to the drive thru window while Kate gathered the pieces of herself back together and crawled back over the center console and sat in stunned, bewildered silence in the passenger seat, leaking arousal and most likely blood, unable to fathom what he’d done to her.

\-----


	21. Chapter 21

She was quiet as he passed her the bag with their food - his food - but she was present. He’d learned over these last four years exactly what it felt like when she spiraled, when she shut down on him, and he had known he had to stop that shit in its tracks. He had, it seemed, even if she was a little stunned.

Well, he was too. He hadn’t thought he was going to be doing that - he had very clearly told himself, and her, that he wasn’t going to be doing that. That they couldn’t. And now... he didn’t know. He didn’t think he’d damaged her, that it was only the rawness of her flesh, the swollen tissue and abraded skin - and maybe, also, shock that he’d done it, had such little disregard for her physically.

But his regard had been entirely for her. That had been the whole fucking point.

He pulled back onto the road, rain sheeting the windshield so that he had to turn the wipers on high. The pavement under the tires was slick enough that the Subaru shimmied as he got it going down the highway, back towards their host’s farmhouse, and the lightning cracked a rent across the dark sky ahead of them.

“Kate,” he clipped.  
She roused. “Yeah?”

“Open up the bag, baby, and pull out the rolls. I’m famished.”

She didn’t answer, but he caught sight of her obeying, the sound of the bag rustling in her lap. The overwhelming scent of bread filled the car and her stomach grumbled. She handed him a fat roll slathered with butter and he took it with his teeth, needing both hands to make the left turn into the storm’s wind shears.

She sucked in a breath, dropped her hand. He kept the roll in his mouth until he could grab it, tearing out a bite and swallowing without tasting it.

“Eat one,” he told her, gesturing towards the bag. “Bread is easy and you’re hungry even if you don’t realize.”

She didn’t answer at first, didn’t move. He couldn’t look at her right now, had to drive - the thunderstorm was gearing up again, getting restless. He might have to pull off under an overpass if it kept up.

“Kate Beckett. Eat.”

She huffed, opened the bag again, the scent of rolls filling the vehicle. He glanced once her way, quickly, saw her nibbling. 

“Very good, baby.”

She reached out and smacked her hand against his shoulder and he laughed, eyes crinkling in relief. Breathing a little easier too. He hadn’t fucked them up with that, which - really - he could have. He didn’t entirely know when to stop or how; he was going on instinct.

“Can we talk?” she said suddenly.

He nearly drove the Subaru off the road. “Of course.” He darted his eyes to her and saw her knees drawn up into the seat and folded his direction, just as she’d done on the drive over. “Let me pull over, babe.”

She let out a little breath and he peered ahead in the darkness, saw another overpass upcoming, nudged the vehicle a little faster as the storm swirled outside.

“You don’t need to stop,” she said, hesitating.

“I do, actually. I wouldn’t concentrate enough on the road - and the storm is getting severe, love.”

She licked her thumb - butter, he supposed - and he quickly ate his own roll as they approached the overpass. He slowed the Subaru to below 40, glancing in the rear view mirror to be sure no one was behind them, and then he pulled off the highway under the concrete arch. The storm was muted under here, but it still swept across the road in violent sheets, the wind switching directions every few seconds.

When he killed the engine, he left the keys dangling in the ignition - her keys, the keychain he’d bought her with its wicked metal spikes in the shape of a wolf, really a weapon for self-defense, a way to give her back a sense of security, assured in her ability to handle herself if only she had a sharp edge.

She’d been livid when he’d given it to her, but he knew she had also loved it. 

He fingered the sharp edge, turned to her, willing to hear whatever she had to say because this was what they needed - to really talk, to be honest, to clear things.

“Shoot,” he said. “Well, not literally, sweetheart, even if I deserve it.”

Her lips twisted. “Not about what we deserve, didn’t you say that?”

He nodded, swallowing roughly, and she handed him a roll. He laughed, pulled it apart to eat the soft, warm inside, tasting butter. It was really good, and he was distracted for a moment by the way she nibbled on hers and licked her fingers free of the butter, apparently still thinking.

“Kate?”

She shot him a grimace. “I know. I’m - trying to find words.”

“Alright. I can wait. We’ll have to stay here a little bit - the weather got a lot rougher while we were in the drive thru.”

She nodded, her eyes on the storm. Thinking. He waited until she finally looked at him. She gestured to the weather outside. “Did you - ever love storms as a kid? I know you don’t have a lot of memories of regular things, but just - did you stand in a summer storm and tilt your head back and taste the rain or sit outside while the thunder and lightning were still rolling in?”

He wished he could say he had. “I don’t have - any idea. But I love them now.”

She nodded, chewed on her bottom lip a moment. “Me too. I mean, I always have.”

He waited, took another slow bite from his roll, tried to figure out what she was driving out.

“Storms are dangerous,” she started, shook her head. “I wouldn’t let Wyatt and James go out if it was lightning, you know? Even super, it’s not a good idea. This - no, I wouldn’t let them play in it. But when I was a kid, I always found a way. Sneaked out of the apartment and went up on the roof, of all places. My mom would’ve had a fit if she knew, if she’d known.”

“Attracted to danger,” he murmured.

She nodded slowly. “I think so. And you?”

“For sure.”

She gave a lopsided smile, looked at him again. “I don’t know what I’m trying to say. I guess - you’re dangerous, I get that. You’re a thunderstorm, lightning and thunder, but I won’t go inside. And I have to - trust you when you say you’re sticking outside in my storm too, no matter the lightning strikes. Does that make sense?”

“Yeah,” he said, swallowing roughly. He was not going to cry right now. For fuck’s sake; she wasn’t asking to marry him. But damn did it feel like a promise. “Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. Are we colliding fronts? Because I think those cause tornadoes.”

She choked out a laugh and looked at him, and for once he really thought she was seeing him. Not the guy who had taken her out of Black’s facility and played at the hero, and not the man who was father to her children, but himself, who he was at base, who their connection made her privy to.

She tilted her head, suddenly sensual before him, like her confidence was back. “I think Wyatt is tornado-like, if that’s what you mean, but James is too sedate for that.”

He grinned, felt the way his whole face broke into joy. “Yeah, true. We can ride it out, you know, we’re gonna come through our storms together, love.”

She chewed on her bottom lip again, studying him. “I - don’t know. I can’t see that like you evidently can, that I’ll make it to that or - God - that you will, intact, and-” She shook her head, took a deep breath. “But I’ve got to act like I believe it, or - at least - have faith in it because to do otherwise... it’ll kill me to do otherwise.”

“I know,” he rasped, some of his joy falling off at the thought. “I could - feel that from you, Kate. Did you know that? How very clear it is when you were - just how much you-” He pressed his thumb and finger into his eyes, pressed hard. “It feels pretty shitty to feel you wanting to be dead.”

She let out a harsh breath, the sound whistling in her chest. “I’m - sorry for that. Really I am. It’s not fair that you get all this shit from me and-”

“Please don’t even.”

She stopped, nodding hard. “No, you’re right. I - it is fair, I guess, since you’re also able to feel how much I love you.”

His breath left him in a rush, because fuck yes, he felt that. “Shit, baby. I - God. I feel that for damn sure.”

She gave him a tight smile, something a little more hopeful in her eyes. “At least there’s that. For all the times I self-destruct.”

“Damn good feeling.” He shook his head like a dog. “Shit. Overloaded with feeling, love.”

She gave him a wider smile, and it never flagged, the sense of her pressed intimately to him, and he’d had it before, he had felt it like this, but there was a difference between pushing inside her body for this sensation and just sitting in a car waiting out a thunderstorm with her entirely cognizant and aware of what she was doing.

“Been practicing,” she murmured.

“Prac-practicing,” he gasped. “You’re projecting right now. Oh God.” He squeezed his eyes shut and sucked in a deep breath, felt like he was drowning in it.

“Does it hurt?”

“Not at all,” he croaked, forcing his eyes open. “Fuck. This is - must be what Colin feels when he’s high.”

She laughed, sparkling, it was like her laughter was little sparkling gems falling out of her mouth and sinking through the air towards him. He was high, holy fuck; he was soaring on her.

“It works,” she said, smiling so wide now that he could cry. She put the food in the floorboard and crawled over the console and into his lap, framing his face with her hands. It was all he could do just staring at her, swamped with feeling, his emotions so strong that he could devour her. “Remember what Colin said about being a mirror? You can do that with me like James does and-”

She stiffened, eyes shot wide with darkness, and he hoped to God he was doing it right, visualizing it correctly so that all that feeling he felt compounded and built and shimmered back at her, the combined force of hers and his so that-

“Oh,” she gasped, tightening her hold on his cheeks, drawing herself closer. “Oh, God.”

“Yeah?” he gritted out, staring at her, memorizing this feeling. “You never - you never did this to me before, like this, so I don’t know if I’m-”

“You - you are,” she whimpered, crashing forward so their foreheads thudded. Her mouth was open at his but they couldn’t - it would ruin their concentration - and this feeling was so intense, the way it was like feedback, circling and circling and building to a crescendo that must be a climax, must be, because it was everything they did physically the same but now, here, like this, it was so much more.

She squeaked and suddenly rose up on her knees, her body jostling his, and she cried out, the feedback loop shattered as she bent nearly backwards, throat working, hair dusting the tops of his hands.

He held onto her as the feeling slowly resolved into the normal touch of invisible fingers against his insides, until she was sinking back down into his lap and curling up.

“Kate?” he husked. His hand combed through her hair, pressing his cheek to her temple. “Kate, sweetheart, did you-”

“Yeah,” she panted, nodding against him. “Yeah, the moment you - when you angled it back at me it was just...”

“You came,” he said reverently, cupping the back of her head and kissing her softly, worshipfully. “You came from love.”

“Don’t I always?”

\-----

She loved the feeling of his body under hers, against hers, hearing his heart beating at her ear and sensing the touch of him inside her like skin pressing to skin but without skin at all.

She couldn’t explain it. She only knew that the moment he had opened that door inside the facility where she had been standing over the mutilated body of John Black, the sense of him had been so present within her that she hadn’t attacked him. Soaked in blood lust and the wildness of her dark side, which she knew now how dark it could be, she had not attacked him.

She had been entirely knocked off balance by the feeling, unable to fathom it, knowing only that somehow he was the same as those two babies she had done everything to save.

She still didn’t know how this happened, despite her practice on the boys on rainy days when they were irritable or tired. It made Wyatt giggle, her projecting onto him, and it made James shy and sweet, cuddling into her, and so she must be doing something right, but she hadn’t expected this from Castle.

They were twined together by more than just this connection; it was four years of having him inside her, physically, that made this possible in just this way. 

He hummed against her cheek. “Think so.”

Like that, thoughts passing between them even when she felt locked down, held fast within herself. He still managed to be part of her.

“Lot like sex,” he murmured. “Right?”

“Well, for me, certainly was,” she smiled.

His hand cupped the back of her head, scratched at her scalp. “I didn’t know we could do that when we aren’t fucking, did you?”

“No,” she sighed, nuzzling down into his neck. “Had no idea.”

“Good for you, sweetheart?”

She laughed, a short sound, too tired for more. “Yeah, love. Good for me. You?”

“Very,” he husked. The emotion textured his voice and she felt it swirling within him as well, within her from him, so that she didn’t know if the appreciative lump in her throat was due to him or her. “Kate. I can’t even tell you.”

“Good,” she whispered, closing her eyes. “Wanted to - surprise you with it. Forgot until now. Make up for all-”

“Don’t even put it in the same league,” he gruffed. “You do so well at shutting down, locking your bad feelings into those small spaces, that I never quite can catch on to what’s happening until it’s almost too late. It’s only been this time - it just broke you down to a place where you couldn’t keep me out, and how that led us to last night, really, and-”

“Did you feel it like that last night?” she said, lifting her head to look at him. “Because I - I don’t know what I felt only...”

He combed the hair back from her face and she felt his regard for her even as she saw it in his eyes, his sense of her and studying her for clues, wanting to know her better, to explain it to both of them.

“Last night I needed you too much to feel much of your side of things. Except at the end, I think. Somehow that punched through. Almost... this sounds strange, but isn’t it all strange? An open wound, rubbing against - salt.”

“Two wounds,” she murmured back, dipping her cheek against his palm. “I think more like that. Two open wounds, raw to raw.”

He nodded, sober in his study of her. “Yes. That. I needed it. It felt like I was - able to have all of you. In ways no two people ever have. Or should.”

“Shouldn’t we?”

“I don’t think it would be healthy for you - for either of us, honestly, - if we fucked like that all the time. There are other things I need just as much - like this, being tender and the way that felt just now, mirroring your projection so that it built and built. Last night was like gritting my teeth and blowing shit up. This, tonight, was like - finding you all over again.”

She sighed and leaned forward, touched her lips so lightly against his, brushing back and forth. “The way you speak, the words you have for things...”

“Did I do good?”

“That’s perfect,” she murmured, kissing him again to seal it.

He wrapped his arms around her and held her down against him, and she felt it, how content he was, how satisfied with himself and with her, how she fit into him in a way that was right, a way he had been aching to find all his life. Finding her all over again as the only right fit for him.

That he was the only person who could have ever made her feel the same seemed extraordinary.

They waited out the rain together, and for the first time in months, she could stay.

Her thoughts did not drag her to darker places because the darker places were already here, living and exposed, opened up before them both. He was in the the darker places and somehow her thoughts centered only on him, around and around, like he was projecting this time.

But she knew he didn’t project. He only mirrored, just like James did, and so she must be feeling only what she already had within her to feel.

\-----

Ready to go home now.

It circled in his head on loop, easy and soft, and he knew without having to think about it that the idea was formed and firmed between them both, together. He didn’t have to ask, she didn’t have to bring it up; it was already there and centering, contented with the night.

Castle lifted his hand from her back and caught the hank of her hair, twisted it into a knot at her nape, giving him an excuse to rest his fist there, close to her turned head. She kittened against the heel of his hand as she always did when she felt good about herself, and his heart expanded painfully in his chest, his other arm banding tighter around her.

Drowsy, Kate rubbed her chin and cheek against his hand where he was balanced at the neck, the slope of her shoulder, and her sigh came so close that he could hear it above the storm outside.

He did love lightning and thunder; he loved to be outside in it. He had imagined he felt the electric shock of the ozone discharging, that it nipped through his skin and set his heart pounding, excited the molecules in his brain. Maybe it did, maybe it didn’t, but if she was his thunderstorm, he understood now why the appeal.

“Might take the boys out into a thunderstorm anyway,” he murmured, his chin against the top of her head. “There was that storm when we were camping, so...”

She laughed. “I just - bad example, maybe. I think they already play in the rain. But something like this?”

“Naw,” he admitted, glancing through the windshield. “And good example. Perfect example.”

“I thought of it only because you’re so confident.”

“I’m what?” he laughed.

She laughed back, her fingers folding around his bicep. “Watching you drive in this horrendous shit, and you’re barely even batting an eye. You said you had to pull over anyway, but I bet you didn’t need to.”

He huffed, chuckling a little. “Caught me. I - do have to pay attention. But you wanted to talk, and that’s my first priority. Not the damn rain.”

“And straight-line winds, gale force winds, right,” she said dryly. Her body shifted against his, rearranging a foot, pressing her knee back into the seat, better positioning. 

She must be hurting; he didn’t know what his impromptu masturbation in the front seat had done to her insides (he hadn’t been trying to be careful, only insistent), but he figured her discomfort was high. 

But, as usual, he couldn’t feel it in her. She didn’t knowingly dwell on her own body’s discomfort. She didn’t seem to have the capacity for it any longer. Whether that was natural to her (it had to be in some respects, otherwise she never would have survived in the beginning), or whether it was the result of life in that facility, Beckett couldn’t actually spend any conscious thought on her pain. 

Subconscious was there; she jerked back from a hot stove, she shifted in his lap. But the conscious thoughts were never directed towards it. He wasn’t sure how to probe her for it, for anything other than what she naturally exuded (he had often thought of this thing they did, this connection, as more like really intense pheromones, and on some level there had to be access; he couldn’t just stomp through her brain). 

“You’re awfully cognitive,” she muttered.

He laughed. “Thinking about you.”

She stirred and lifted her chin, glancing at him in the darkness, and she raised a hand to touch his cheeks. “Growing a beard there, super spy.”

He felt her touch like electricity, like standing in that summer storm, and he dropped his head to kiss her lips which were so amused with him. He rubbed his cheek against her mouth so she felt the beginnings of his beard, and she laughed, squirming, opening herself up to him so that he felt the flood of arousal as it bathed her.

He kissed her, mouths open, tongues touching, heat without purpose. She drew her arm around his neck and straightened up in his lap to meet him, accidentally knocking cheeks, chins, foreheads as they touched and kissed. He couldn’t remember the last time they’d made out like this, but damn did he want to do it again and again.

“Institute a new house rule,” she husked, teeth at his bottom lip. A laugh. “Make-out sessions every day are now mandatory.”

“Sounds damn good to me,” he husked.

“Something about it, knowing you won’t - you can’t - fuck me, something dangerous about it.”

He growled, but she was right, he wouldn’t, couldn’t do that damage unless she deserved it, unless she was shattered apart by her own darkness. “Yeah,” he roughly gave her, cupping her face in a hand and moving for the arch of her throat. “Very dangerous. Like when we first met, and you weren’t allowed to come.”

“Oh, God,” she groaned. Her body rocked against him but he stilled her hips with a heavy hand. She mewled and attacked his mouth once more, and the mating of their tongues, the slide and thrust, the way she always touched his teeth with that swirl, it all overwhelmed him.

She touched his neck. She fluttered her fingers down inside the collar of his shirt and caressed his collarbones. She tugged on his shirt only to pull herself closer, lips pressed to lips, and then she touched his waist, the bare skin at his abs, his belly button.

He was hard of course, but she didn’t touch him there, just all the rest of him, back in his hair to scratch his scalp and fingers his ears so that he was burning everywhere - and not a chance of relief in sight.

He kissed her, she kissed him, and they touched, rediscovering old wounds and soothing those places, finding new hollows, familiar hardnesses, the ever-unfolding beauty of her body and his.

Make-out sessions were definitely becoming a house rule; he didn’t care how she made fun of him for it.

\-----

Kate watched her spy handle the car expertly as they drove through a brilliant thunderstorm. He was so confident, competent, that even the drumming fat rain on the roof and how the winds shook the SUV, she barely looked at the road.

She just watched him.

He was mid-five o’clock shadow, that rough bristle on his neck and jaw, not yet filled in at his cheeks. She couldn’t remember when the last time he had shaven, but the scruff was appealing for its bite and its brooding. He looked dangerous like this, those wide strong paws for hands, the width of his shoulders, the thickness of his thighs. She wasn’t sure she’d ever have been one for body builders, and she’d had a few skinny art-types for high school boyfriends, but this size, this capability, his width and girth and...

She sighed, adjusted her legs under her in the seat. She reached for the bag of fast food and dug out the french fries he’d ordered for her. Against her will. Or rather, because he knew better.

He had always known better, and wasn’t that a good chunk of her issues? She didn’t know better; she was incapable of long-term stability. She would always be this messed up, like her wiring was bad and the circuits looped off into dead ends and sparky connections. She either just didn’t have it, or she was lighting up and burning the damn house down.

She started eating mechanically, knowing she had to get real food in her, something with starch to weigh down the proteins. She knew that, but when he’d added the fries, she had inwardly quaked, not wanting them. Forgetting, ignoring, that she absolutely had to keep her nutrition levels exactly right for her body to stay stable.

Nothing about her was stable.

She was simply pushing fries into her mouth, one after another, mindlessly, when the horror crept over her again. Rose in her gorge so that the fries were one hard mass in her throat.

She had let that drunk idiot fuck her against a brick wall and then she had gone back to his place intending to do it again. To let him do it again. To be sure, to really be sure she had burned her house down.

Kate choked, her eyes burning, face turned to the passenger window. Blind and unseeing. Seeing too much. How could she go home like this, after this? Oh, God. Oh God, what about the—sex she’d had—what about the after—consequences. There were consequences to this that went deeper, but also surface, surface, and would last... forever.

“What’s wrong?” he said. That snap in his voice that brooked no arguments.

“What if I... really fucked us up?” she gasped. Her chest was caving in; she had to prop it up with a hand to her sternum. “Not the emotional—that’s so deep already, but I believe now, I believe in you, at least, you can do it, out of anyone—”

“What are you talking about, Kate? You need to string together a coherent sentence for me.”

She dug the heels of her hands into her eyes. Salt from the fries stung the abrasions on her cheek where her face had been shoved against the brick. She was starting to collapse, pieces coming off her carefully built facade. “What if I’m pregnant?”

“You aren’t.”

She fought down the tightness in her throat, had to think, had to see it clearly. “If there wasn’t—I didn’t want to protect myself, Rick. Oh God, I—”

“Kate. You can’t be pregnant. Nor do you have any STDs—”

“Fuck,” she croaked, fresh horror spilling out of her guts.

“You do not. What’s wrong with you? We took care of that. I took care of that, I should say. The morning after pill, the douche between your legs in that damn fucking bathroom?”

Her mouth dropped, but nothing came out. A wheeze in her lungs.

“Do you not remember?” he hissed. His hands were white on the steering wheel. “Beckett.”

She closed her eyes, opened them again. “No. I don’t remember.”

“Kate.” A swift glance, the frown marring his features. “Kate?”

She fought it, the white that threatened to zip her up inside herself and leave her defenseless to her insanity. She couldn’t white out right now.

“Kate,” he said, voice easing. “I took you to a motel room, when I found you. After you called me, baby. You called me.”

“I called you,” she husked. She had called him? She had called him. “There was an old... I used the phone. Mine was... I left mine.”

“I need you to not block this out, Beckett. I need you to fucking remember this event, and what it felt like, and how you gutted me, and worse, worse, how you fucking immolated yourself.”

She sucked in a breath, let it out again in a ragged tear. Her eyes burned. “I called you. I wanted to kill it dead, but I couldn’t. I love you.” She broke, weeping, shame burning hot behind her eyes, and she pulled her knees up to her chest and buried her face there.

His hand circled her ankle, arm angled crookedly over the console but his hand firmly keeping hold of her. “You killed me with that, that’s true enough.”

She wept, burning behind her eyes, burning in her chest. 

“I gave you the pill, got it from a CIA stash. The rape kit, cleaned you up. In that grimy bathroom. Do you remember? Sitting on the side of the tub for me.”

She nodded against her knees, sucking in breaths that wouldn’t fill her lungs. Still crying so hard that ugly noises tore from her chest, rivaled the storm itself.

He squeezed her ankle bone and made her hurt, her head jerking up. He shook her leg. “Stop it. It’s done, it’s over. But you better damn well remember how fucked up this was, how nothing will keep me from you, and your penance.”

“P-penance,” she rasped.

“We’re working it out, aren’t we?”

She choked on breath, nodded again.

“You won’t get pregnant, Kate.”

She broke again, a fresh wave of weeping that seemed to want to rip her out at the roots. 

“I’d never let that happen to you again,” he murmured, his voice pitched to equal the rain, almost too low to understand.

But she understood. And she was certain of him, even if she couldn’t be of herself.

Kate tilted sideways and huddled over the console to press her burning eyes to his thigh. His hand fell to the back of her head and his fingers sank into her hair, mussing the pony tail again. 

She cried a little more, his hand keeping her anchored, and this time, she let the relief wash through her after. Like a breeze dispelling stagnant summer-storm air. 

It had been going so well this time. Even though he’d brought her to the city, she had been surviving; she’d been keeping it together.

Not well enough. Not good enough.

The next time she broke, what fresh terror would she bring into their lives?

\-----


	22. Chapter 22

Now parked back at the bed and breakfast, Castle pulled the keys from the ignition and closed his fist around them. Let them bite into his palm. Her cheek was pressed against his thigh, her body slack with sleep. Warm. He touched his free hand to the back of her neck, lightly, pulled his gaze from her.

He stared up at the old house instead, listening to the storm bellow and blow around the SUV. He’d already had her car taken home by one of his agents, and of course Colin had the boys and was driving them straight back.

He’d thought to take a more scenic route, but maybe that had been a mistake. Maybe they ought to just go straight back to their castle in the woods, forget trying to prove something to her. 

She’d never accept she was worth something to him. Worth it. All of it, this. Worth the shit, worth the fear, worth the not-knowing where she was. To be here now. This moment, in the rain in a car parked in front of some random bed and breakfast because she’d done a runner and fucked someone—

He could have done without that part, of course, but he laid that down. Again. Right now, in the dark, in the rain, with Kate’s head resting on his thigh and her body contorted over the console to get there, he laid it down. Took a breath.

Castle leaned his head back, a knot of grief pushing up his throat. Was it foolish and selfish of him to want to be the only person who had ever touched her? Was it just more of that neanderthal bullshit conditioned into him by his father’s program? You’re mine, and it was fucking hot when they were having sex, but maybe out here in the world, the real world (not just the one they created between them), it shouldn’t be a thing he hung onto.

“Rick,” she sighed. But she didn’t lift her head, didn’t stir, just a murmur of his name like a sigh. Like a dream. She whimpered, caught her breath, and now his name was a cry—

“Kate, I’m here.” He scooped her up by the back of her neck, reached across to pull her into his lap. She was too thin, too thin, damn it. “I’m here. It’s me, come on.”

She gave a broken sob and came awake. He knew she was awake not only by the jolt through their connection but the stiffness in her body. She froze. And then she flung her arms around him and pressed in tightly, a ragged breath.

“I got you. You called me, and I came. Even if you hadn’t called me, I’d have come. Always come for you, baby.”

She nodded. Not even a double entendre in response, so she must not be back yet.

“Come on. Sweatshirt, where’d you put it?”

She shivered.

“See? Not only do you need it for the rain, but you’re already freezing. Your core body temp drops when you haven’t eaten the right balance—”

“I know,” she scraped out. Sat back. Pushed her hair out of her eyes in a messy way that did nothing at all.

So of course he couldn’t help but do it for her, scrape it back behind her ears, unthread it from her damp eyelashes. Until she was blinking and staring at him.

“Sweatshirt,” he prompted.

She turned her head and leaned over, pulled it out from where it had slipped between the seat and the door. He put his hand on her hip to help her balance and she righted, started struggling into the sweatshirt. He tugged it down in the back when she got stuck, and her head finally poked through, her hair messy again.

“God damn it, I love you,” he croaked. Cupped her face in his hands and kissed her. Fast.

She stared at him, mouth opened by his insistent lips, face flushed and pretty and darkly gorgeous in a way that made him ache. Her chest expanded on a huge inhalation, and then she blew out her breath slowly. Nodded. “Why I... you deserve better. I’m gonna make it. I promise, I’m gonna make it. I hit a lot of walls, but I’m—”

“You don’t hit that many, all things considered,” he interrupted. “Now get off my lap and crawl out of the SUV. I’ll be right behind you.”

“With my dinner. And my drink; I can’t run with it.”

“Yes, ma’am.” He saluted and she gave him something like her usual smirk (but the confidence wasn’t there, it really wasn’t, and they both knew it). “Go.”

She swung her legs to the door and then popped it open, hopped out. Water splashed up and must have doused her to the knees, but she kept going, running for the porch. Castle grabbed the fast food bag and their drinks, and he went out after her. 

\-----

Once inside the room again, they fell into their usual habits at dinner time. She grabbed the laptop and called up one of the tv shows they liked to binge-watch, and Castle set out their food on the little table.

She sat beside him, shoulder to shoulder, tapped the space bar on his laptop so it would play. Not a comedy; she didn’t think she could do that right now, the normalcy those shows were usually based on, normal situations she didn’t have. But the murder-mystery in space; so fantastical and epic that it didn’t touch her real world.

It worked. She knew Castle liked this one too. They sat side by side and finished dinner, and watching the screen kept her from thinking about the food she was putting in her mouth, the statistics and numbers, the control she surrendered by giving her body what it needed to survive.

Pathetic, but she still had issues with food. Anorexia had slithered along her peripheral vision too many times these last five years. She couldn’t let it get its hold on her; she needed to eat. So this was their usual solution.

Castle finished first, as he usually did, inhaling his food and not pausing to speak until he was done. “Fries were good. Surprisingly.”

She nodded, though she’d barely tasted the fries. A hard knot in her throat before she had started weeping, that was what she remembered of them. Salt and... “Vinegar?”

“Yeah.”

She kept her eyes on the laptop, watching the female detective in her specialized suit do a space walk outside the ship. His arm coming around her shoulders made her flinch, but she settled fast and canted into his side. He didn’t seem upset by the flinching, though she knew she had, in the past, hurt his feelings. At the beginning of things, she had hurt his feelings time and again.

But he knew her too well now; he stayed where he was, arm at the back of her chair, fingers buried in the nape of her neck. He scratched at her hairline, smoothed his thumb there where her spinal cord lifted to her skull. When he began digging into those muscles that braced her vertebrae, she tensed in reaction, tensed until his fingers brutally released those knots.

“Shit,” she breathed, eyelids drooping.

“You’re worked up.”

“No kidding.”

He chuckled. The sound was so reassuring that her shoulders began to ease. Slowly dropped the more he worked those fingers into her muscles. He tapped the table in front of them with his other hand and she startled, realized she’d been about to fall asleep. He tugged the hamburger closer. “Finish this.”

She nodded, plucked it from the wrapper and put it in her mouth. A few more bites, that was all it would take. Five maybe. She’d eaten three-fourths. No, more like two-thirds. There was a chunk of it left. She wished he hadn’t ordered cheese, but he liked cheeseburgers and never could understand why she wouldn’t want cheese on hers.

Cheese had milk proteins. Right. Damn, she needed to keep track of these things again, be good again. Meat, obviously, the cheese was a bonus because it had healthy fats. Tomato and lettuce were wimps, usually, and he hadn’t put them on her burger. Cheese, ketchup to keep it wet, no mustard because he knew her well enough to know it would be too much, the zip of flavor would be an irritation to her senses.

He really did love her; it was evident in his attention to deal, even as it was evident in his touch. She had spent too long pretending she wasn’t shackling him, she had spent too long telling herself that it wouldn’t matter, in the long run, what happened to her if they all had each other.

It mattered.

“You finished?”

She nodded, crumpling the paper in her fist, swallowing down the last bite, the cheese sticking. A piece of overdone burger. He handed over her drink and she took a grateful sip of what turned out to be cold gatorade. Made a face that had him laughing.

“You thought I ordered you soda? No fucking way.”

“Tea,” she complained. It could have been unsweet tea.

“You need sleep,” he said, quiet again. “You need hydration to keep your kidney function—”

“Yeah,” she admitted, taking another swallow of the gatorade. Cold and plain yellow, like piss. But the tropical punch flavoring made her sick to her stomach; she’d been force-fed the neon red in the hospital after the motorcycle accident. Made her think of those babies, sobbing with her pain.

She damaged everything she touched.

“Come on,” he said. Fingers digging in her elbow. “Bring it with you to the bed. I’ll bring the laptop.”

She obeyed because he really left no alternative. She brought the gatorade up to the side table and then crawled into bed and straight under the covers. Her cheek hit the cool pillow and her stomach stopped flipping dangerously, began to settle. Castle came curving up next to her like the closing of a parentheses, the laptop in the space between their curled bodies.

Her knee bumped the open lid of the laptop; onscreen the story had cut back to the minor character’s romance while the detective did a dangerous space walk outside safety parameters. The juxtaposition of the minor character’s romp in bed, the giggling, with the female lead’s grim face and determined jet to the dark side of the ship was enough to give Kate pause.

But she didn’t know what to tell him. She didn’t know what to say; she had said a hundred ridiculous necessary things already, and putting more words between them would only create a gulf. 

Castle was lying on his bicep, elbow bent so that his fingers touched his forehead. She was about to try something else, one more word, when his arm extended and his palm rested at the side of her head. Palm over her ear. Fingers down at her neck and under the collar of her sweatshirt.

She couldn’t speak; the words were muted. A thickness in her throat. Tears spilled from her eyes, soaked the pillow in moments. And then gone. That was all; she had no more tears left, and the grief sapped from her. Left her. She didn’t want to watch the show; she didn’t want to think or move or listen. She wanted to press her face to his neck and not be anything at all.

Especially not a used, broken thing.

Castle sighed. He shifted up to his elbow and closed the lid of the laptop, silencing the detective mid-space walk. When he put it on the bedside table and came back to her, she didn’t stop to think, to second guess. She just scooted into him and did exactly what she’d been craving to do.

Castle wrapped his arms around her. Brought her under him, resting his weight on her hips and ribs until she grunted, and only then did he ease to one side. 

She didn’t cry now. She didn’t have the energy. She was too tired.

\-----


End file.
